


Beholden

by Animom



Series: Temenos [5]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: Closure, Confrontations, Gen, Magical Artifacts, Past Abuse, Post-Canon, Terminal Illnesses, Virtual Reality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-21
Updated: 2013-08-28
Packaged: 2017-11-21 23:15:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 28,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/603141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Animom/pseuds/Animom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A mysterious phone call leads to the reappearance of a figure from Kaiba's past - a figure Seto is not prepared to face again.</p><p>Note: Marked as gen, but deals with sexual themes and includes flashbacks to incidents of abuse and assault. Slight overtones/references to Jounouchi/Kaiba and Pegasus/Kaiba.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Yu-Gi-Oh is the intellectual property of Kazuki Takahashi and Konami, and is being used in this fanfiction for fan purposes only. No infringement or disrespect of the original copyright holders of Yu-Gi-Oh! or its derivative works is intended by this fanfiction.
> 
> Author's Note: This story is the conclusion of a five-story series (Impressions, KP Duty, Coming Clean, Face Voice Hands, and Beholden) about the shattering and eventual re-integration of Kaiba's persona through his often-antagonistic friendships.
> 
> For the most part, all five stories try to follow canon Yu-Gi-Oh characterizations and events as presented in the unedited second-series anime (with supplemental details from the original 38 volume manga): however, because a non-canon event (Seto being assaulted by the Big Five while soulless at Duelist Kingdom) has been added and two key characters (Pegasus and Gozaburo) have been distorted, these stories are by definition AR (alternate reality). While it is not necessary to have read all the stories that precede this one, this story does reference various non-canon fictional events from Impressions and KP Duty.
> 
> In terms of timeline, you can consider this to take place at least fifteen years after Duelist Kingdom (and thus at least year after the end of Face Voice Hands). Mokuba is in his late 20s, Kaiba in his early 30s.

.

.

As always, he had chosen a flight that would bring him into New York well after midnight—and he knew that, as always, Mokuba would give his "apologies" to the guests. They'd never discussed it outright, but Seto suspected that his brother continued to schedule parties for the day of his arrival for that very reason, to give him a face-saving way to avoid an uncomfortable social occasion—and for that he was grateful. Then too, as as much as he looked forward to seeing his brother, he had learned that it was prudent to spend the first night sleeping in a hotel to gather his strength: Rebecca invariably planned activities for every hour of his visits with them.

Once the limo was underway he pulled out his phone. "I'm on my way to the hotel."

"It's too bad you'll miss the party," Mokuba said wryly. There was the sound of music and laughter in the background.

"It's still going on?"

"Yeah. Everyone's having a great time. We're not kicking them out until the neighbors complain."

Seto heard Rebecca say, "Tell that stinking party-dodging antisocial brother of yours I said hi, and wish he could have made it for once."

"Becca says hi," Mokuba repeated dutifully, than added, "Just so you know, there's more than a few people here disappointed that you didn't make it. _Again_."

"Tomorrow, Mokuba," Seto said, and hung up, closing his eyes and letting himself doze until the driver pulled up in front of the hotel.

His room, apparently, was the second best penthouse, as the manager kept going on and on about how sorry he was that the VIP suite had been booked by a dignitary who could not be relocated at such a late hour. Once the manager and cadre of bellhops had backed away Seto bolted the door and undressed, draping his jacket, pants and shirt over the chairs of the dining table then slipping gratefully into bed, where he spent a quarter of an hour trying to will himself into drowsiness before conceding that he was wide awake. He sat up, called room service to order a light supper, and then began to run water for a hot bath. As he took one of the hotel's complimentary bathrobes from the closet he decided that an extra housewarming gift to appease the Wild Hawkins might not be amiss and so rang the concierge, asking that an unopened magnum of champagne be added to his bill.

The enormous bathtub was barely a quarter-full when the knock came. "Room service."

"One moment." Seto retied the bathrobe belt, then opened the door.

The waiter wheeled in a small cart. Sliced pâté and fruit on a marble slab, the champagne in an ice bucket. "Shall I uncork and pour, sir?" he asked, taking two champagne flutes from the bottom shelf of the cart.

Seto raised an eyebrow. "Two?"

The waiter glanced at the clothes draped over the chairs. "For you and your—?"

Did they actually think he had a companion in the room? The presumption infuriated him. "No," he said, "I was going to give the champagne to someone as a gift, but I've changed my mind. Take it away."

"My apologies, sir."

"And the food as well. I've lost my appetite."

Once the chastened waiter had left Seto re-bolted the door, then went into the bathroom. The steam from the softly splashing water had released the scent of a hidden potpourri, and the subdued lighting made everything—the water, the gleaming fixtures, the spotless marble surfaces—sparkle and glow

He turned off the spigot, angrily pulled the stopper, and went to bed.

.

There was a ringing.

His cell phone.

He snatched it from the night stand, squinting at the display. American number. West Coast area code. Caller unknown. "What?"

"May I speak to Mr. Kaiba Seto?"

"This is Kaiba."

"I hope I'm not interrupting any of your work meetings—it's 10 am there, right?"

"I'm not in Japan."

"Oh dear! Please accept my apology for—"

"Get to the point."

"My name is Dr. Stanton. I'm the director of the Sheridale Mental Health Center, and ... well, this may sound odd, but I think one of our patients here knows you."

"Five seconds."

"Mister Kaiba, a patient came to us years ago suffering from comprehensive amnesia. He couldn't—or won't—tell us who he is or what happened to him, and none of the usual processes—running his fingerprints, checking missing persons databases, even Interpol—have ever helped identify him," Stanton said.

"So?"

"The only thing this patient has ever said is _kigh_ _basetto_. We couldn't find any translation of that phrase that made sense, and so for years have assumed it was just gibberish. Yesterday, however, our new art therapist reviewed the patient's file and suggested that since our John Doe draws pictures of what she tells us are characters from a game that your company manufactures equipment for—Monster something?—the words might be _your_ name."

"And because of that you called me in the middle of the night?"

"We thought it was possible," Stanton said, with a hint of belligerence, "that if the patient knows you, perhaps you know _him_."

"Unlikely." Seto rubbed his eyes. "Millions know my name."

"I see." Doctor Stanton paused. "I realize it's long shot, but I'm begging you to try. There's not much time."

"There's urgency?"

Doctor Stanton sighed. "Normally I would never violate patient confidentiality, but under the circumstances... John recently had aggressive surgery for an osteosarcoma. Unfortunately the cancer has already metastasized, extensively, and the oncologist believes that John may have as little as a month to live. We're desperate to locate his family. I'm sure they'll gladly re-reimburse you the cost of airfare."

"Airfare isn't a concern," Seto said. "Time is."

"Could I at least send you some photographs and video to look at?"

"Acceptable," Seto said, and hung up.

.

"Hello, hello!" Rebecca said as she opened the apartment door.

Seto tolerated her hug as he looked around for his brother.

"Mokuba's out," Rebecca said. "Trying to hunt down tickets for something interesting for us to see. I'll take those!" She grabbed his suitcases.

Seto, already feeling buffeted by her enthusiasm, sat in a wing-back chair next to the chess table.

"Coffee?" Rebecca called to him from the kitchen. "Or something alcoholic?"

"Coffee."

"Yeah, it's too early for a fuzzy head." She brought cups and a carafe on a tray. "Up for a game?"

"Of course," he said, pulling the game table close and swiftly setting out the pieces. "Black or white?"

"Black. I feel lucky."

He smiled faintly when her second move was bishop's pawn. "Latvian Gambit?"

"I know, right?" She laughed. "Still, no guts, no glory." She made a face as, a few moves later, he moved his queen to the edge of the board and put her in check. "Well, _shit_. So much for the Latvians. I might as well resign: you probably have at least a dozen ways to beat me at this point."

He sipped his coffee. "Eight. You're improving."

They had just started their third game when Mokuba returned, triumphantly waving small envelopes. "I come bearing private box seat tickets!"

"Move that piece and I win in five moves," Seto told Rebecca.

"Why can't I ever _see_ the same things you see?" she pouted. "Five moves. _Sheesh_."

"Your coat is wet," Seto said to Mokuba.

"It rained a little. It does that outside," Mokuba said, slapping Seto's shoulder with the tickets. "You know, _outside?_ That place with fresh air?"

"Overrated," Seto responded, leaning back in his chair and watching Rebecca point and mumble as she analyzed the board. His phone chimed.

"Go ahead and answer. I'll be a while," Rebecca said with a wave of her hand.

Seto looked at the display. It was the California number. "It's not important," hd told them, but of course Mokuba and Rebecca dug the story out of him and  harried him to take a look at the pictures Doctor Stanton had sent.

The first attachment was a photograph, the profile of a man with shaggy ash-blond hair.

"An old KaibaCorp employee, maybe?" Mokuba said. "Though I don't recognize him if he is."

"That looks like a mug shot," Rebecca said. "Does KaibaCorp hire drug addicts?"

"Hundreds of thousands of them," Mokuba said. "The other file's a video?"

"Seems like," Seto said. Low-resolution and small, the clip was of a man with close-cropped white hair, crouched in a corner with his back to the camera. The weathered skin of his neck marked him as at least middle-aged _._ When a voice from off camera said, "Don't be shy, John. Show the nice lady your smile," the man gave a low, terrified animal bray, turning just enough to slap at the camera. The image spun: ceiling, face, floor, blackness.

"That can't be the same guy!" Rebecca took Seto's phone and replayed the clip. "What's up with his face?"

Mokuba watched over her shoulder. "He's half bandages."

"Perhaps he's violent." Seto walked to the window. On the avenue far below, swarms of New Yorkers hurried through the rain.

"He had a buzz cut. If he was in the military," Rebecca said, "maybe he's an old friend of Gozaburo's?"

"Most of his friends that we knew, or that knew us," Mokuba said, "were on our board of directors for a few years after Gozaburo died. Did he look like any of the Big Five, Seto?"

"No." The five men who had conspired with Pegasus to take over his company. The five who had tried to trap him in a VR and kill him. The five who had, at Pegasus' invitation, assaulted him while he was soulless at Duelist Kingdom. Seto found himself undoing the latch on the window, sliding it up. A gust of cool rainy air came through the flimsy window screen. Very few had ever known what had happened that weekend. The Five, who were presumed dead; Pegasus, who had withdrawn from public life years ago; Kurosuke, a personal aide of Pegasus' who had rescued Seto after the assault and given him medical care; and Jounouchi Katsuya, who, as far as Seto knew, had never broken his promise to keep the assault a secret. The duelist Mai Valentine had deduced the truth, but Seto had never confirmed it to her.

Avoiding Jounouchi and Mai's pity had been easy. Avoiding Mokuba's would have been unbearable.

"What're ya doing?" Rebecca asked, leaning against his arm.

Twelve floors down to the sidewalk. A fall of less than 2 seconds. "Sampling that fresh air I heard mentioned." He closed the window. "Your air comes with too much noise."

"That poor bastard." Mokuba had his sad face on. "You ought to go out there, Seto. If he knows your name, maybe meeting you in person will jog his memory. The way seeing Honda and Jou did for me."

Seto shook his head. "A waste of time. He's likely just another obsessed Duel Monsters fan."

"So?" Mokuba frowned. "C'mon, Seto, even if it doesn't help, at least he'll die happy."

"I only have this week. Why should I waste it on a stranger?" He scowled. "I'm supposed to be walking around outside and going to shows and eating authentic hot dogs with you two."

"Thanks for making it sound like punishment," Rebecca grumbled.

"Seto, all that will be around for a lot longer than that guy," Mokuba said. "That guy—he _needs_ help. _Now._ You have to go." He turned to Rebecca. "Mind if I go with him?"

"Of course not," she said promptly. "It'll give you some quality Kaiba Brothers time."

"If that's what you want." Seto said with a sigh, setting up the chessboard. "Rematch?" he asked Rebecca.

.

A corporation jet flew them to California, which was much warmer than New York had been. They crossed the shimmering tarmac to the waiting limo then sat without talking, watching the nondescript sprawl of shopping centers and generic housing fly by beyond the ribbon of the freeway. After a surprisingly long drive they pulled up in front of a sprawling two story beige building that seemed as though it had risen out of the barren and dusty earth. A concrete slab proclaimed _Sheridale State Hospital—Department of Mental Health_.

"This is a good thing you're doing," Mokuba said as they got out of the limo. "I hope it helps reunite him with his family. They'll want to take care of him, be with him until he dies."

The front door led to a small waiting area. An orderly behind a metal-barred window took their names, and a few minutes later they were buzzed through to a small lobby. A man in a suit and a woman in a white lab coat hurried toward them, their shoes clicking on the speckled gray linoleum floor.

"You must be Seto Kaiba," the man said as he extended his hand. "I'm Doctor Stanton. I want to thank you again for taking the time to come out here. This is Dr. Adel, our art therapist."

Seto folded his arms—he reserved handshakes for meaningful occasions—and said, "My brother, Kaiba Mokuba."

As Mokuba shook Dr. Adel's hand he said, "So you were the one who made the connection to Duel Monsters? Do you play?"

"I used to," she said with a faint smile.

"Can we get you some coffee?" Dr Stanton asked, putting his hands together and making what looked like an attempt at a small bow. "Have you had breakfast? We've got assorted pastries in the staff lounge."

"Our time is limited," Seto said.

"Of course." Stanton looked apologetic. "Doctor Adel will take you to see John. Stop by my office on the way out."

.

Doctor Adel swiped her ID card and they passed though a heavy door into a large open ward that reeked of cigarette smoke. Patients in street clothes, pajamas or hospital gowns sat on plastic furniture watching a television protected by a safety cage or shuffled around listlessly. Sleeping cubicles ringed the room. On one side a nurse behind a barred window dropped pills into small paper cups. Next to the window an orderly passed out single cigarettes to a small group of patients, who hurried to use the electric lighters attached to the wall behind him.

Mokuba gave a soft, low snort of disgust. Seto held his breath: though not as repugnant as cigar smoke, cigarette smoke was not a smell he enjoyed.

They followed Dr. Adel through another ID checkpoint into a hushed hallway. Heavy doors with wire-reinforced windows marched away from them on both sides. Dr. Adel stopped at one.

"John's room." Inside, the man from the video lay on a cot, his hands attached by wrist cuffs to a belt around his waist. From time to time his head jerked and nodded.

Seto's stomach twisted with a sudden anxiety. Why had he agreed to fly across the country to help a stranger?

"Those restraints seem like something from a horror movie," Mokuba said.

"John has been very agitated lately," Dr Adel said quietly. "We've had to cut back on his usual medications so as not to interfere with his chemotherapy."

"You keep him drugged so that he's easier to deal with?" Mokuba asked, his militant crusader tone beginning to surface. "I suppose you use shock therapy too?"

Doctor Adel pressed her lips together, clearly biting back a defensive response. "As a matter of fact, ECT is often helpful for the type of psychosis John has. It calms him. Suppresses his compulsive behaviors. But you're right. It was overused in the early days of mental health care, especially in overly-crowded facilities."

Mokuba held up his hands. "Sorry. I'm sure you're doing the best you can. Is he a danger to himself and others?"

Doctor Adel didn't answer right away, as if weighing the sincerity of his apology, then sighed and said, "When he was brought in eight years ago he was put in solitary overnight for observation. I'll show you what he did by morning, but I warn you—it's somewhat distressing." She opened the folder she carried and took out several large photographs, handing them to him and Mokuba. "These are the pictures that led us to contact your brother."

The photographs showed a bare room whose walls were covered with large, crude drawings of magical symbols and creatures, including a crude Blue Eyes-like creature surrounded by lesser monsters.

"Yeah, definitely Duel Monsters," Mokuba said.

Seto shrugged. "Not very well drawn."

Mokuba looked closer. "Well, since he was working in the dark it's pretty impres—" He sucked in his breath and continued in a completely different tone of voice. "He drew these during _observation?_ "

"What's observation?" Seto asked.

Mokuba's face was solemn as he explained. "When a patient is admitted they're put in a bare room and observed overnight—I guess since seeing how they react to stress and boredom can tell doctors a lot—but they aren't allowed to have anything that they could use to harm themselves. Stuff like belts, shoelaces, eating utensils, pocket knives ... and definitely no pens or pencils, either, right?"

Doctor Adel nodded her head. "That's right."

Mokuba pointed to the photograph he held. "So if he had no paint or brushes or chalk or anything you'd normally draw with, the only way to make these is if he he _finger-painted_ the pictures. With his blood for paint."

Dr. Adel nodded. "Very astute. He used the bolts attaching the bed to the floor to lacerate his fingertips. He also apparently bit his arms and legs in an unsuccessful attempt to find a more plentiful blood supply."

"I … see," Seto said faintly. What would drive someone to tear at themselves like a rabid animal?

"That's not all," Doctor Adel continued. "According to the case notes John has attempted to repeat this behavior more than once. For health and safety reasons he's kept sedated and restrained during those interludes. And that's primarily for his own protection, not the hospital's convenience."

"Why not just let him draw?" Seto asked.

Mokuba nodded. "Yeah, I was wondering that too. Give him safe art materials? Non-toxic paint or something. Chalk? Crayons?"

Dr. Adel shook her head. "John rejects traditional media. He's compelled to paint in blood." When Mokuba opened his mouth she added, "Believe me, my predecessors have _tried_. One gave him pig's blood to paint with. He wouldn't touch it. Another sterilized a stainless steel fountain pen and pretended to stab his own leg and fill the chamber with blood—no, no, it was red ink," she added quickly, "but as soon as John had the pen he used it to open a vein in his wrist."

"Put a muzzle and gloves and long sleeves on him," Mokuba said, handing back the photograph.

"We've tried that too," Doctor Adel said. "If he can't get blood he'll draw with semen and feces."

Mokuba looked shocked and disgusted. "That's ... _Really?_ Wow."

"Putting something of yourself in your work ... the sign of a true artist," Seto murmured, feeling a small triumph for goading Doctor Adel into an angry look.

"Creative expression is part of his illness?" Mokuba asked quickly.

Doctor Adel paused, then said, "I actually feel that it's an attempt to escape it, but the fact that he's non-communicative has made that difficult to prove."

"He's trying to draw because he can't talk?"

"Possibly." She hugged the file to her chest.

"There must be a better way to get through to him."

"I wish we could find it," she said. "Are you ready to see him now?"

Mokuba looked at Seto, and he shrugged. "Might as well get it over with."

Dr. Adel unlocked the door.

As they walked into the room the figure on the bed twisted to look at them. As in the video, the left half of his face was hidden by bandages; what was visible of his forehead, cheek, and chin were mottled yellow and purple.

"Post operative bruising takes a while to fade," Doctor Adel said.

"What kind of operation did he have?" Mokuba asked.

"Initially it was for removal of cancerous growths in the bone surrounding the eye socket, but I think they also removed tumors from surrounding soft tissue."

"Eye socket." Seto stared at the man on the bed, making visual corrections, peeling back the years to the man he had been. "He was missing an eye long before the cancer."

"Yes," Dr. Adel said with surprise. "That's exactly right. Do you know who he is?"

"A true artist," Seto whispered.

The man on the bed made an odd, garbled noise.

"He's an American," Seto said, noting how muffled his voice sounded. "Birth name Maximillion Julius Crawford. When he was twenty-one he legally added "Pegasus," using it sometimes as a family name and sometimes as a given name. He has an old scar on his left shoulderblade and upper arm."

The man on the bed was now struggling wildly against his restraints, his hoarse voice rising to a shriek as he screamed, "Oh God! Oh God! Save me. Save me! _Save me!_ "

.

Dr. Adel hurried them out into the hall as the doctor on duty and two orderlies rushed into the room to give Pegasus a sedative. As they followed her back to the hospital director's office the screaming behind them subsided, shut out by door after door.

Stanton looked up as the three filed in. "Well?"

Seto repeated what he'd told Doctor Adel.

"Fantastic! Do you have contact information?"

"His family is from Nevada. Near Las Vegas," Seto said. "He founded a company called Industrial Illusions. It's based in San Francisco."

"Odd that no one from that company reported him missing." Dr. Stanton said as he made notes, then stood. "Thank you for your help," he said, coming around to the front of his desk and motioning Seto and Mokuba into the hall, clearly planning on escorting them all the way back to the hospital's main entrance. "He's had chemotherapy, of course, and he'll have palliative care to keep his last days as comfortable as possible, but sadly he's never been coherent or cooperative long enough to meet the informed consent requirements for experimental treatments. I'm hoping we can set something up now that we have a way to contact his family."

As they entered the main lobby Doctor Stanton held out his hand. "I'm sorry we had to meet under such sad circumstances—it's always difficult to say goodbye to an old friend."

Seto pushed the glass doors open and stepped out into the blaze and heat, leaving Mokuba behind to endure Doctor Stanton's handshake and final words. "Lucky for Mr Crawford he had guardian angels helping us to get him back to his family and loved ones."

Mokuba hurried to catch up. "That was unexpected and weird. I assumed he'd died years ago. You didn't know either?"

Seto didn't trust himself to reply.

"Any chance you're going to tell me what's going on?" Mokuba asked carefully. "You seem upset."

"Nothing is going on." Seto stared at the sun-bleached landscape. "I'm looking forward to getting some sleep in New York."

.

"Didja miss me?"

"Always, sweetheart," Mokuba said, kissing her on the cheek. "Always. Have fun while I was gone?"

"I had an offer from a co-ed soccer team," she said, "but I turned it down. I draw the line at re-enacting the _Satyricon_."

"That's my girl. No sense of adventure," Mokuba said cheerfully. "What's for dinner?"

"I'm feeling lazy. What do you say, chess partner?" she asked Seto. "Should we dump some greasy nitrate–loaded hot dogs in your belly, or let you off easy with Thai take-away?"

"Thai." The idea of food wasn't at all appealing, but he knew how to go through the motions.

As Rebecca went to the kitchen to get the carry-out menu she asked, "So it was Pegasus. huh?"

"Yeah."

Mokuba was still watching him: rather than meet those too-astute gray eyes Seto made a show of checking his messages. Amid all the usual clutter was a message from his lawyer. As a general rule he ignored messages marked URGENT—unless the sender was someone who who rarely used that label. He dialed, noting that his call was answered almost instantly. "What is it?"

"The legal department at Industrial Illusions contacted us two hours ago," his lawyer—who never wasted time on chit-chat—said, "to appraise us of an unusual document in their possession. We have examined the document, and though unusual it is both legitimate and legally binding. A springing power of attorney has appointed—"

Mokuba and Rebecca, who had been whispering to each other, now approached him with a handful of menus.

"I don't care. Order whatever," he snapped at them, then said to the lawyer, "Repeat the last part?"

"As Mr. Crawford has been determined to be _non compos mentis_ and has no living immediate family or descendants, you are now his agent in matters of health care. Siegfried von Schroeder remains the fiduciary agent."

 _"_ Fax the document to me," he said. "I'll give you a New York number." He snapped his fingers, and Rebecca hurried to her desk for one of her business cards. He read the number to the lawyer, then said, "I'll call you once I've looked it over." He thumbed his phone and exhaled.

"What's happening?"

Seto walked over to Rebecca's fax machine, a dusty near-antique, "There is a document appointing a guardian for Pegasus in the event that he's physically or mentally incapacitated." He wanted to smash something. That scheming, vindictive, toon-obsessed _bastard_.

The fax machine blinked to life and began to buzz with the incoming transmission.

"His family, right?" Rebecca asked. "Didn't he have a bunch of aunts and uncles?"

Mokuba laughed in disbelief. "No way—don't tell me it's _you_? Can he do that?"

Seto pulled the first sheet, dense with text, from the fax machine tray. "It's me, and apparently he can."

.

He studied the pages as Rebecca went to pick up dinner.

"So is it legit?" Mokuba asked.

"Legal says so. Except that I'd never agree to such an arrangement."

"Contest it."

"I might," Seto said. "After I find out why he forged the document. What he was planning."

"It was probably a joke. You know how he was."

_Yes, I know how he was._

"If he _was_ planning something," Mokuba said, setting out plates as Rebecca bustled back in with bags of carryout, "then either he knew he was going to wind up the way he has, or he's been fooling those doctors for years. Both of those are a stretch, don't you think?"

"Didn't he turn Industrial Illusions over to Ryuji and Zig to run before he retired?" Rebecca asked, opening containers. "Why not just make one of _them_ his guardian? Are either of them are executors of his estate?"

"Good questions," Mokuba asked. "Do you know?"

_The date._

"Earth to Seto. Hello?"

 _He couldn't contest it, because he probably_ had _signed it._

"To the day," he said numbly.

"What?"

"Exactly six years after he defeated me at Duelist Kingdom."

Rebecca looked from Seto to Mokuba. "I don't get it. What's special about that, other than rubbing Seto's nose in a reminder of the defeat?"

Seto cleared his throat. "It means," he said tonelessly, "that I could have signed it when I was—" He couldn't go on.

Mokuba stepped in. "Pegasus was a weird guy back then. Like, _criminally_ weird. Locked people up in dungeons. Did stuff that, uh, made people very open to suggestion."

"Like, drugged you? But you were kids!" She was enraged. "He should be in prison!"

"He had me add enough years to the date to make it legally binding." Seto clutched the pages.

"And had those slimy goons of his witness it," Mokuba growled. "I wonder what _else_ he had you sign."

"So what are you going to do?" Rebecca asked. "File charges?"

"No." Seto felt something blaze up, an emotion he hadn't felt so strongly for years. _Anger_. "I'm going to take him out of that hospital and keep him from dying until I find out what he was up to."

.

.

_._

Many thanks, once again, to **Dark Rabbit.** I touched this chapter last, though, so all errors are mine.

.

(09) 1 April 2014.


	2. Arrangements

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As they prepare to take custody of the terminally-ill Pegasus, Seto finds it more and more difficult to keep the secrets of his past hidden.

 .

.

Mokuba had accused him years ago of not understanding what made people tick unless Millie, the KaibaCorp computer AI, collected and analyzed data for him—and while that had been true once, he had long ago learned to do his own observation and analysis.

Doctor Stanton had clearly started with the intention of focusing on him—which made sense, he was not only the elder but the intended custodian—but when Seto did not participate in the American handshake custom, and kept his sunglasses on against the relentlessly-bright California sunlight and fluorescent lighting, the doctor had hesitantly switched his attention to Mokuba, glancing back and forth between them until it sunk in that Seto had willingly conceded the conversational lead to Mokuba's superior social skills.

The clock ticked loudly. "Is there a problem with the paperwork?" Mokuba asked.

Doctor Stanton licked his thumb, using the moist finger to turn a page. "Not really. Just some points I'd like to go over. I see that a Mr. Kurosuke is listed on the discharge form? I assume he is the same Kurosuke who was stipulated as the preferred caregiver in the power of attorney document?"

"Yes," Mokuba said. "Kurosuke was Crawford's chief of security once, but he also has medical training. He's arriving tomorrow evening."

"A licensed physician's assistant, I see," Stanton said. 'That's all well and good, but you do know that you will need at least two additional caregivers for around-the-clock care? Considering Mr. Crawford's diagnosis, you might want to forgo the clinical trial and just place him in hospice straightaway—I can recommend several excellent facilities."

"If we did that he'd be surrounded by strangers all the time," Mokuba asked. "Didn't you say that familiar faces would help bring back his memory?"

"I said Mr. Crawford _might_ recover his memory," Stanton corrected. "Might. There are no guarantees even in a healthy individual. When you factor in the progression of his illness, the potential side effects of experimental treatments, the stress and chaos of being relocated to a strange environment—"

"There will be no chaos," Seto said firmly.

Doctor Stanton looked down at the papers again. "But I _already_ see chaos, Mr. Kaiba. You expect us to release Mr. Crawford to your custody without providing the local address where he will be taken?"

"We're looking at houses tomorrow, " Mokuba said. He took out his wallet and removed a business card which he held out to Stanton. "This is the realtor we're working with. I'll have an address for you in a day or two."

Stanton made a note of the number, then handed the card back. "One other thing puzzles me," he said, adjusting his glasses. "You two obviously knew Mr. Crawford well enough to agree to become his guardian. Why didn't you ever report that he was missing?"

Seto didn't like the insinuation. "I wasn't aware that this was a police investigation."

"I didn't say it was," Stanton replied. " _Should_ it be?"

"Hey hey, calm down everyone," Mokuba said. "Doctor, my brother and I participated in a gaming tournament Peg ... er, Mr. Crawford ... hosted when we were teenagers, and we had occasional business dealings with him, but once he retired we lost track of him."

"I see. It seems odd that he held on to this document, then."

"It was a joke," Seto said. "He had a childish sense of humor."

Mokuba nodded. "That's my take too."

"Yet he seems to have treated the document very seriously," Stanton said, frowning. "He had it witnessed and sent to his lawyers for safekeeping." Stanton looked down at the papers on his desk for long moments before continuing. "I must be honest with you. I have reservations about releasing Mr. Crawford into your custody."

"Why?"

"Because it seems to me that you clearly are unwilling to take on this guardianship." Stanton folded his hands and leaned forward. "In fact, it has been suggested that we file an injunction to prevent Mr. Crawford from being removed from this facility."

The comment was a slap in the face. "Who is making that suggestion?" Seto demanded.

"I cannot say."

"Until last week, Doctor," he said, careful to keep his voice calm, "every minute of my every waking hour was spent running my multinational corporation and its subsidiaries, yet this unexpected responsibility has forced me to set everything aside."

"Is that an admission that you resent having to take care of Mr. Crawford?"

"Of _course_ I resent it," Seto said angrily. "It's an inconvenience. But that will not prevent me from doing what needs to be done." Mokuba was looking at him strangely. "I'd think you'd be relieved, doctor," Seto said, forcing himself to sound casual, "to have such a disagreeable person removed from your ward and the state's ledgers."

Stanton, it seemed, had no sense of humor. "That's not how—"

"Oh, he didn't mean it," Mokuba said quickly. "He's trying to be funny."

"It's hardly an appropriate subject!" Stanton said, but they were saved from further scolding by the telephone's ring. "I'll need to take this," Stanton said, "Would you excuse me?"

"Of course," Mokuba said, pulling Seto out into the hall and closing Stanton's office door. "You look like hell today, big brother."

"Blame the temperature extremes," Seto said, removing his sunglasses to rub his eyes. "Too hot outside, too cold inside."

"Hey, I had an idea," Mokuba said. "I don't think Pegasus ever sold Duelist Island. Instead of trying to rent something, why don't we see if his mansion is—"

"No."

"Why not?" Mokuba kept going. "It's ideal. Familiar surroundings, plenty of space, a helipad ... the tech probably needs updating, but that's easy to do. Hell, I'll bet we could even get most of the gang out there. It'd be like a reunion party."

"I will not go back to that place."

  
_Gleaming under the blinding fluorescent lights,_   
_steel tables with piles of dishes,  
flashing knives and angry hands …_   


"Seto, I know something's going on." Mokuba had his serious face on. "I'm worried about you. _Talk_ to me."

He needed, once again, to be careful. Mokuba didn't need to know about things that could never be changed. "Talk about what?"

"Pegasus. You two were close when we were kids—I even remember being jealous that he got to talk to you in e-mails all the time and I didn't—and now it's like you hate him. Why?"

Mokuba was never going to know about the loser who was too weak to avoid being fucked over by five men in the Duelist Kingdom kitchen. "He kidnapped you and tried to destroy our company. That's reason enough."

"No, that was business. There's more to it than that," Mokuba insisted. "I _know_ there is."

Seto put his sunglasses back on. "No, There isn't."

"Fine. You win. Topic dropped." Mokuba pointed toward the front of the building. "Go back to the hotel. Get some sleep. I'll finish up with Stanton. Any opposition to enrolling Pegasus in one of the experimental clinical trials?"

"Pick whatever will make best use of him." _Let the lab rat die in agony._ "And—"

" _And_ you want me to call you so that you can listen in." There was affection under the exasperation. "You're _such_ a control freak." He took out his phone.

"I trust," Seto said, answering the call as he walked away, "that you will tell Stanton only what is necessary to get him out of our way."

"Funny how your trust involves eavesdropping," Mokuba said as he slid his phone into his pocket.

 

.

The car was on the freeway before Stanton called Mokuba back into his office and the conversation resumed.

_"Your brother isn't joining us?" Stanton asked._

_"No, I sent him off to get some rest. This past week has really worn him out."_

_"The disruption must be stressful on you both," Stanton said. "Surely your company's staff could help with the arrangements?"_

_"We don't feel like it's something that can be delegated."_

There was a long pause. Seto glanced at the phone to make sure that he hadn't been disconnected or muted, then realized from the faint rustling sounds that Stanton was still going over the paperwork. Couldn't the man read faster than 20 words a minute?

_"If I ask you a question off the record," Stanton said unexpectedly, "would you answer it? Off the record?"_

_"That would depend on the question," Mokuba said._

_"Would you tell me about your brother's relationship with Mr. Crawford?"_

Seto gripped the phone.

_"We had a tough time when we were kids," Mokuba said. "Our parents died when I was a baby. Our relatives screwed us over and we were sent to an orphanage. We were adopted by Gozaburo Kaiba, who didn't want my brother to do anything but focus on studies. Gozaburo didn't let us hang out with other kids, since he believed that having friends isn't productive. He even kept my brother and I apart most of the day so I wouldn't distract him."_

_"That must have been a painful, lonely childhood."_

Seto scowled. What was Stanton doing? Mokuba didn't need psychoanalytical bullshit.

_"It sounds worse than it was, but I'm getting off-topic. You asked about Pegasus."_

_"Pegasus?"_

_"Oh," Mokuba chuckled. "That was what Mr. Crawford preferred to be called back then. Anyhow, despite the obstacles, he and Seto became pen-pals. Pegasus was like a big brother to Seto—they're only eight years apart."_

_"I see. But I assume they had a falling out?"_

_"Yeah, when my brother was in high school."_

_"Did something inappropriate happen, or did your brother simply outgrow him?"_

Seto took the phone away from his ear, holding it with both hands at he stared at the Mute button.

A slither of nausea uncoiled in his stomach. _Inappropriate_. Well, that was certainly one way to describe it.

_"After Gozaburo died Pegasus started trying to take over our company."_

_"That type of behavior could certainly destroy a friendship."_

The pompous old fool had no idea. Nausea turned to rage: Seto gripped the phone so hard his hands hurt.

_"As we said, Pegasus probably dared my brother to sign that document," Mokuba said, "just to mess with him."_

_"But … " Stanton sounded offended. "Why would your brother go along with such a charade if he was no longer on good terms with Mr. Crawford? And why is he willing to honor such an arrangement now?"_

_"Because," Mokuba said, "Seto likes to win. Even if he doesn't know what game he's playing."_

 

.

"Are you sure you don't want to see the inside?" The realtor, a tiny blonde woman in pastel business attire, hurried after them. "Five bedrooms, six bathrooms, three fireplaces, eight thousand square feet in the main house, three bedrooms in the guest house for the nursing staff, a helicopter landing pad, a pool house—it's everything you asked for!"

"A pool house?" Seto muttered to Mokuba. "You asked for a pool house?"

"Yes. Swimming is very relaxing," Mokuba answered. "And we could be here for weeks. Months."

"Doubtful," Seto replied. "He'll die soon."

"Getting your hopes up, huh?" Mokuba teased.

The realtor was determined to continue her pitch. "The owners are very flexible about the lease, you can set your own terms ..."

"She's still talking?" Seto got into the car and took out his phone.

"I don't understand why your brother won't take just _five minutes_ to look inside," he heard her say to Mokuba. "It's _beautifully_ decorated. All furnishings one-of-a-kind, made by local artisans. I _assure_ you, it's the best house on the market."

He waited a few beats in case Mokuba was going to answer, then said, "And yet you held this so-called best until last. You may wear other clients down by showing them garbage until they are desperate, but that will not work with us." He began scrolling through his messages. "All you have accomplished is to waste our time."

Mokuba leaned down to scowl at him through the car window. "Seto? Participate. This should be your decision too."

"Why? You provided criteria," he said. "They obviously have not been met."

"Actually _all_ the houses we've looked at have been exactly what we need," Mokuba said. "I was just hoping there'd be one that _you'd_ like more than the others."

"Houses are all the same to me. Boxes with carpeting. I have no preference."

Mokuba straightened up and said the realtor, "I guess this one will do, Sherrie, since we've gone through everything else."

"Well, there _is_ one more, but—"

"Of course. There is always one more," Seto muttered.

"What type of property is it?" Mokuba asked.

"You wouldn't be interested," she said. "It's in the middle of the desert, miles from the road and neighbors. The house is small. No pool, no high-tech. I suppose you _could_ land a helicopter there, but the guest house is—" She paused. "Well, trust me, it couldn't be _less_ of what you want."

"Her conviction that it is unsuitable most likely means that it is ideal," Seto said, not looking up.

Mokuba ignored this. "Tell me more about it."

She sighed. "It has—well, it has what we usually pitch as a 'colorful' past. Built by a wealthy eccentric—although for legal reasons I can't give you his name—it's very odd architecturally."

"Odd how?"

"The rumor is that it was designed for private parties at which, um, unusual entertainment was provided."

" _Entertainment?_ Really?" Mokuba chuckled. "Now you've made me curious."

Seto didn't understand why his brother got into these sort of conversations with strangers.

"After the original owner died," Sherrie continued, "the property was used for a while by various federal agencies as a safe house, but it hasn't had regular tenants in decades. We don't show it unless specifically requested, since the place pretty much gives people the jitters. A movie was shot there about fifteen years ago, and every few years someone rents it for weird weddings, but mostly the local kids go there to drink and fool around." She paused. "Which means that it's ... well, there's likely to be trash and graffiti. It's not what I'd consider showable. "

"I'll take that into account. Let's go!"

Seto waited until Mokuba was in the car to ask, "Why are you prolonging this ordeal? Didn't you just agree to lease _this_ house?"

Mokuba shrugged. "Yeah, but another half-hour isn't going to kill anyone, and it'll be fun to check the freaky house for mysterious stains."

 

.

They followed the realtor's car as it turned off the main road and drove across the desert toward foothills speckled with clumps of low vegetation, finally stopping near a dry stream bed at the base of a cliff.

"Out of the way is right," Mokuba said, grinning.

"I don't like the look of this, sir," their driver said, discreetly taking something out of the glove compartment.

Seto—who assumed that the driver had retrieved a firearm—replied, "Yes, but It's the first thing today that hasn't been boring." He watched 'Sherrie' wobbling as she stepped carefully across the rocky ground to them.

"We'll have to walk the rest of the way," she said. "It's not far."

"Want me to tag along?" the driver asked.

"No, stay here and keep watch," Seto said as he got out of the car. "Fire a warning shot if there's danger."

"Warning shot?" Sherrie's eyes were comically wide.

"He's joking," Mokuba told her. "Lead on."

The stream bed led through a narrow passage, then took a turn into a box canyon whose relatively smooth sides and floor had clearly been excavated by heavy machinery. A long, one-story shed with a slanted roof was at the far side of the canyon, a structure with no visible doors or windows in its vandalized walls.

"Ugh, I apologize for all that," Sherrie said, paging through a small notebook. "Just let me find the keycode."

"Written on paper. How quaint." Seto folded his arms, then walked past her to the far side of the shed. "There's no need to go inside."

The wall he faced was transparent. Behind the spray-painted gang symbols and crude pornographic drawings was a spartan interior. Dirty white walls, devoid of any decoration. Two metal bed frames without mattresses, a metal table with four metal chairs. In the back corner a steel washbasin and toilet. There was a metal door—he assumed it was a door, though it had no visible handle—set into the side wall. The floor was tiled, with a number of small drains. "The government had poor taste in decorators."

"I've heard they actually improved it," Sherrie said, still searching her notebook. "I know they added the, ah, _facilities_."

"It was built without a toilet?" Mokuba asked. "Why would anyone agree to live there? It would be like being an animal at the zoo."

"Or," Seto said, "that was the e _ntertainment_."

The realtor, with a surge of false cheer, said, "Oh, here it is, the code for the house—do you even want to bother seeing it?"

"The house?"

Sherrie pointed at the canyon wall: what he'd taken to be irregularities in the stone were in fact small, very deep-set windows. "So this—" He turned back to the small building.

"Is the guest house, yes."

"So not only did he put people in a cage, he designed the house so that he could _spy_ on them?" Mokuba now had the look of pained outrage he usually reserved for endangered species and rainforests.

Sherrie looked distressed.

"And now," Seto said, "show us the house behind the peepholes. My brother wants to check the rooms for bloodstains."

 

 

.

_The silver-haired prisoner had been confused at first._

_Confusion transitioned to panic once he noticed that the room's only door had no handle. He pounded on the heavy transparent plastic wall, then tried reaching the corrugated tin ceiling by standing on a chair atop the table. When neither of these allowed him to escape he began shouting and throwing the chairs._

_The entire performance was eerily soundless to the watcher who sat hidden in the cool shadows of the main house._

_When the prisoner finally tired he went to the sink, raging when the faucet gave him no water. He spent several seconds looking down into the metal toilet, but apparently could not yet bring himself to drink from it._

_The watcher smiled. Someday soon, hunger and thirst and pain and terror would drive the silver-haired man to debase himself in many, many ways._

_At last, his sweat-soaked shirt evidence that the temperature inside the guest house was well on its way to being unbearable, the prisoner curled up on the tile floor, utterly defeated ..._

 

.

Seto opened his eyes. He was lying on a leather couch, covered with a soft blanket, in a huge open room. A three-story wall of glass gave a panoramic view of the surrounding hills, gold with purple shadows in the late afternoon sun.

Mokuba sat a few feet away in a deep leather armchair. "Welcome back," he said quietly, closing his book. "Feeling any better?"

"What ... " Seto sat up, fuzzy-headed. He was disoriented by the unfamiliar surroundings: tables made of boulders, lamps made of driftwood, rustic woven rugs swirling with blue and green. "Where am I?"

Mokuba chuckled. "This is the house we rented. You don't remember? You passed out in the car after we left the hotel yesterday. I let you sleep while we went to the airport to pick up Kurosuke, and since you were still in dreamland when we got here, we just carried you in with the rest of the luggage, stole your shoes, and dumped you on the couch."

"How long was I asleep?"

"About twenty hours," Mokuba said. "I was beginning to wonder if we'd have to scrounge up a spare bedpan."

"Kurosuke?"

"He's in the guest house," Mokuba said. "Along with the two nurses."

Seto was annoyed. "You sat reading for an entire day instead of waking me?"

"Nah, I've done lots of things. Yesterday I signed for the medical equipment, called Becky, calmed down your PA, went swimming."

"The pool is adequate?"

"More than adequate. You should try it."

"So this house meets your criteria?"

"I guess," Mokuba said, getting out of his chair to lift up the stone disc in the center of the massive stone coffee table. Under the disc was a charred hole. "Hey—I think this is a firepit table! I didn't think you could use these indoors."

"Focus, Mokuba." It seemed that there would always be a part of his brother that was an exuberant child. "There's something wrong with this house?"

"Nah, it's fine. Not as exciting as the Freaky Human Zoo House, but the view's much better."

"Agreed."

"Anyhow, this morning Kurosuke and I picked Pegasus up from Doctor Stanton and took him in the 'copter over to to Loma Linda."

"And that ... went well?"

"You want details?"

"I suppose I should hear them." He shrugged.

"The treatment is definitely aggressive," Mokuba said, settling back into his chair. "They packed radioactive ceramic pellets in his eye socket, and gave us IV bags for chemo. On the way back the helicopter scared him and he threw up a lot. He's been pretty out of it since." Mokuba shook his head. "He looks _old_ , Seto. Really old. As if he's aged thirty years the past few days. He must be in a lot of pain."

_Good._

"Want to go over to the guest house to see?" Mokuba was pretending to be nonchalant, but was watching him avidly.

"If you wish."

As they walked across the flagstone patio separating the main house from the guest house, Seto acknowledged that he was just as apprehensive—perhaps more apprehensive—about seeing Kurosuke as he was seeing Pegasus again. After all, Kurosuke had been the one who'd rescued him after the Big Five and Pegasus were done with him; cleaned him up, tended his wounds, hidden him from further harm until the tournament was over and his soul had been returned. Kurosuke's only acknowledgment of their shared experience had been, year after year, a simple New Year's card. The sight of that envelope had at first worried Seto, thinking that Kurosuke would require bribes to keep silent, but as time went by and Kurosuke made no attempt to blackmail him, Seto's disbelief had turned to relief, then gratitude, and finally a muted indifference, as the memory of what had happened to him became like seeing a photograph, a photograph of something that had happened to someone else.

But now here he was, about to be face to face again with the one person who had not only saved his life—and thus was owed a debt that could never be repaid—but who knew all the secret details of his ordeal. If he wasn't careful, Mokuba would pick up on the hidden connection, and would want to know why Kurosuke was more than a dim face from his past.

"We set Pegasus up in the master bedroom, " Mokuba said as they walked across the flagstone patio separating the main house from the guest house. "It had plenty of space for the medical equipment, and it's insulated from the noise in the main living area. Obviously Kurosuke took one of the guest bedrooms, and though the two nurses are commuting they said they appreciate having the second bedroom in case they need to stay overtime."

"And you're telling me this why?" Seto asked, though he was secretly relieved to have had his spiraling thoughts interrupted.

"No reason," Mokuba said. "Small talk."

As they entered the guest house Seto noted its efficient design. A central foyer opened into a combined kitchen and dining area that adjoined a living room. Mokuba pointed to a doorway on their left. "Hallway to guest bedrooms. The master suite is at the other end of the house." He crossed the living room. "You coming?"

 

_._

Mokuba was right; the man on the bed looked much older than the Pegasus they had seen at Sheridan State Hospital less than a week ago. It wasn't just that his shaved head was dusted with faint silvery stubble; it was the overall impression of frailty and defeat. Oxygen tubing was looped over his face, an IV dripped into the back of one hand, and most of his face was covered with an orange bandage stamped with the symbol for radioactive material. Various small displays against the wall on either side of the rented hospital-type bed monitored pulse, heart rate, blood oxygen level.

_Wouldn't it be easy to make all the numbers go to zero?_

"Hello, Kaiba-san."

Kurosuke was shorter than Seto remembered, and his dark gray hair had gone white, but he still had the same patient eyes.

 

 

_"Everyone will know what he did to me."_

_"They will not, unless you tell them. You will see.  
Have courage young man. You will persevere."_

"Is he still unconscious?" Mokuba asked.

Kurosuke nodded. "Yes. Under great stress the body shuts down to conserve energy for repair."

"Like sleeping?' Mokuba asked.

"A similar principle."

"Do you think he'll be awake at all?" Mokuba asked. "Before he, you know, passes?"

"I can't say."

"Why?" Seto asked. "You have things to say to him?"

Mokuba, surprised, looked at him for several seconds, then said, "I guess not. Kurosuke, let us know if there's any change in his condition."

"Of course."

As they went back to the main house Mokuba said, "Look, I know that this isn't the most thrilling way to spend a vacation, but the Pegasus that tried to screw us over doesn't exist anymore."

"No, he's not who he once was."

_But he was that man once._

"I didn't like him either—he stole my soul too, remember?—but in there is just a sick old guy who's dying, and we're responsible for him until he does."

 _It can't happen fast enough._ "I'm already bored."

Mokuba shook his head. "I figured as much. Well, I'll have to tell Becky that I'll be staying out here until the end."

"You weren't going to?"

"No, originally I promised go back until she finished teaching for the semester, but if Pegasus might not last that long..."

"There's no need to stay." _Y_ _ou don't trust me to be alone with him. "_ Unless you plan hold his hand while he dies," Seto said.

"It doesn't seem right."

"You've already done more than enough—" _m_ _ore than he deserves_ "—in arranging for the house and the nurses and the clinical trial. Go back to New York."

"It'll only be a couple of days," Mokuba said.

Seto could see the dawning eagerness in his eyes. Mokuba's emotions were far too transparent, but the advantage was that he received immediate gratification when Mokuba was happy

"What are you going to do while I'm gone?" Mokuba asked. "I hope you won't just sit around sulking?"

"I have ways to deal with boredom." Seto said, and then, "I'll have a pod shipped out."

"A _pod?"_ Mokuba shook his head. "I swear, Seto, you and your VR. Go hiking in the real world for a change."

"The real world has far too many bugs."

"VR has bugs too."

"Yes, but those are the kind I can control and eliminate." Seto shrugged. "I'll dust off the _ken-do_ program Millie designed for Tantalus."

"That old thing? With the cave and the Immoveable Master?" Mokuba laughed. "Don't overdo it, okay?"

"Of course not."

"We'll be back with cookies and ungraded student essays before you know it." He hugged Seto. "Take care of yourself, big brother."

 

.

He waited until Mokuba had left for the airport before he went back to the sickroom.

The sun outside the windows had set, and in the twilight Pegasus was lit just enough by the glowing monitors to look like a corpse. A ridiculous, empty husk. Seto could barely stand to look at him, yet at the same time he felt driven by a strange compulsion.

Kurosuke came into the room and stood beside him.

"If he doesn't remember who he is," Seto said, "he doesn't remember what he did to me." The words sliced out of him, but in the pain also felt ... good.

"And if you could restore his memory?" Kurosuke asked. "What then?"

Seto stared at the bony hand, the thin skin stretched by the cannula that had been inserted for drawing blood. "I don't know."

But that was a lie.

He would make Pegasus see how his betrayal had warped Seto's life, made it impossible to trust anyone. He would demand that Pegasus explain why he had done what he had done, and then force Pegasus to apologize until he asked—no, until he _begged_ —for forgiveness.

And then he would crush him and send him to hell.

 .

.

.

_~ To be continued ~_

.

.

.

Many thanks to my relentless and exemplary beta **Dark Rabbit.** Special thanks this chapter to **Nalan** for medical details.

I touched it last, though, so all mistakes are mine.

.

(10) 11 Feb 2013


	3. Disclosure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto shapes a virtual reality and makes a frightening choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, grateful thanks to my beta **Dark Rabbit.**

 

.

.

He knew, objectively, that it would take time for the technicians at California KaibaLand to take his personal VR pod off line and ship it to him. They would, of course, precisely follow the instructions he'd written, would back up his settings, remove the sensitive electronic components from the pod body, attach the proper grounding and padding and shielding against the heat and vibration of the freight truck.

He knew all this, and yet the waiting chafed him. He needed the pod _now._ Not only was he beyond bored—the owners of the house Mokuba had rented had hideous taste in books and movies and music—but knowing that Pegasus was only a few hundred paces away, and that Kurosuke could appear at any time to give him an update, was curdling his days with fury and dread. His nights were hardly better, delivering him to mornings where he woke exhausted, half-strangled by sweat-soaked sheets, no memory of his dreams other than knowing that they had been unpleasant, but also making him ache for physical touch for the first time in years.

Mokuba suggested that he ask Kurosuke to prescribe a mild sedative. "Or call Stanton to write you one," he said. "He knows you're stressed."

"You've been living in America too long," he said. "You think there's a pill for every problem."

"Stop being an ass," Mokuba said lightly. "It'll only be a few more days until we'll be down there to keep you company."

Seto felt an unexpected surge of bitterness and envy toward Mokuba and his happy, uncomplicated life. "Don't inconvenience yourself."

Mokuba didn't answer right away. When he did it, was only to say, "Why don't you code a new VR module? You completely ignore everyone and everything around you when you do that, so it ought to make the time pass more quickly."

Seto frowned, and was just about to ring off when Mokuba added, "Oh, I almost forgot-there's a note by the computer with the information for the video stream."

"Video stream?"

"Of the guest house. I know how much you hate to walk." There was a woman's voice in the background; Mokuba said, "Gotta run. Have fun!"

Seto walked over to the computer and tapped the keyboard. The blank screen bloomed with a grainy picture—from the angle the camera must be on a high shelf—of Pegasus, motionless in the bed. A nurse sat reading in a chair next to him.

Seto laughed. So Pegasus's room was being monitored around the clock and broadcast over a private internet channel? it seemed that his little brother didn't trust him: was he really that worried that Seto would go over there with a metal pipe and ...

He clenched his fists.

_Hit him until he screamed?_

No.

_Beat him until he was terrified and bleeding?_

No.

_Piss on him once he was broken and humiliated?_

He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. Was he ever going to be free of this? This event that had crushed his life and become the hated core and center of his being ever since? _When would it be over?_

He didn't realize he'd been shouting until the echoes faded.

He swallowed-his throat was raw. He felt sick and weak, which made him furious. Emotions. He hated having them, wished he could cut them out like a tumor, because every time he thought he had everything under complete control, every time he relaxed his guard, they blindsided him, throwing everything into chaos with their churning ... He had to do something, but what he wanted to do—to corner Pegasus and take vengeance—he knew could not do. Not because it was wrong, or because he'd be caught, but because it was pointless. Pegasus' current state, without any memory of who he was or what he had done, made him useless. it would be like haranguing a random stranger.

The longer Seto stared at the computer screen, the more he realized that his only option—other than waiting for Pegasus to recover, an outcome that seemed unlikely-was to interact with a simulacrum in a virtual world. Granted, it wouldn't be as satisfying as the real thing—Ryuken and Tantalus had taught him that—but it was better than nothing.

And, as Mokuba had pointed out, at least it would give him something to do.

 

.

Creating a usable avatar of Pegasus was a challenge, but fortunately he remembered where he'd archived the body and face mapping. As he used logged into the archival section of the KaibaCorporation servers he was surprised to see how much footage there was of his duels—including Blue Eyes vs Toon World from Duelist Kingdom. The first sight of the file name made him pause, but he took a large swig from the bottle he'd found in the liquor cabinet (whiskey? Scotch? it didn't matter) and grimly clicked.

As the duel played on—he muted the sound after a few seconds—he found it far more difficult to look at himself than at Pegasus. Some of it was dread, knowing what was to come; some of it was mild self-reproach at how rude he had been to Yugi back then; but mostly he felt contempt for his younger self, at how oblivious he had been to danger.

The rest of the footage wasn't so harrowing. Press conferences, appearances at various championships. The dedication ceremony for an art museum. A television spot for an animal cruelty organization—a tidbit that Seto found momentarily amusing in its a while, his subject stopped being Pegasus and became just raw data, a source of sound bytes for voice synthesis, of polygons to be texture mapped into a wire-frame, of movement vectors to be controlled by ragdoll physics. He was startled by a voice saying, "Help me change the sheets before you go?" and looked around to see the twilight in the room and beyond the windows.

He switched back to the video feed from the guest house. Shift change for the nurses. They were folding back the sheets. "Let's get you cleaned up," one of them said, presumably to Pegasus.

He turned the computer off, pushed himself up from the desk, and poured himself another drink.

 

.

He made half-hearted attempts to put Pegasus in generic surroundings, but in the end he did what he had wanted to do from the start: the bizarre construction that Mokuba had dubbed the Freaky Zoo house. He'd understood at once what the original owner might have used it for, and for his purposes … well, for his purposes it seemed a reasonable choice.

He sketched it in quickly; really, a glass-fronted box was hardly deserving of the term architecture. As he added furniture—no beds, no chairs, just a sink in the back corner and a long steel table in the center of the room—he felt a queasy excitement.

 _You'll be in my world now, Crawford,_ he thought. _And you're not going to like my rules._

 

.

He apparenetly drank enough alcohol that he fell asleep on the couch. When he woke it was to morning light, a dry mouth, and the noise of phone and doorbells announcing the arrival of the VR pod.

He had them set it up in the master suite—which was, he had been surprised to discover, actually outfitted as a huge safe room—and repressed his impatient excitement as the tech conducted the connection they had gone he locked himself in the suite and stepped into the pod, settling himself in with a surprising mix of anticipation and reluctance. The eagerness he could understand—it was always enjoyable to see the results of new code—but the reluctance was less explainable. Yes, he was about to encounter the Pegasus of his youth again, but this time Pegasus would be the puppet.

Seto phased in inside the main house. He'd only seen the need to re-create a single room inside the cliff, the "viewing" room. A single chair faced the middle of three small round porthole windows bored through the rock. He walked to the chair and sat down, bringing the empty guest house outside into view.

He exhaled. Time for the trigger phrase. "Toon World."

The door in the back wall of the guest house opened.

Even though he had coded it, even though he knew it wasn't real, even though he was in complete control of the simulation, the sight of Pegasus—flanked by an entourage of five men in dark suits—caused a stab of fear.

He gripped the arms of the chair. He had assigned the animations in this program to Millie, knowing that in her usual thorough way the AI would investigate each of the phrases on the list and create what was required. All he had to do was say the word, and the dark men would hold Pegasus down, beat him, strip him, shove things inside him ...

But he couldn't do it. Even though the scenario had played out over and over in half-remembered dreams and vague fantasies, even though his rage demand to see Pegasus be broken and bleeding and helpless, he couldn't bring himself to take the next step in the sequence.

 _Gozaburo was right,_ he thought. _I am weak_ _. A_ _worthless imitation of a man._

He pushed himself up from the virtual chair and rested his forehead on the virtual window, squinting against the virtual glare at the six figures in the guest house. "Death."

"Not yours, I hope. I like having you around."

He turned around. An image of Mokuba stepped from the shadows at the back of the room. "End program," he said, annoyed with his own sloppiness: clearly, he'd copied unnecessary avatar modules. "End program!" he said again.

"Seto, I'm not software," the Mokuba said. "I'm a pod in New York." He walked to the window, looked at the motionless figures of Pegasus and the Big Five, then turned. "I got a call telling me you'd locked yourself in the safe room with the VR pod. People were concerned."

"Which people?" Seto demanded, though he suspected it had been Kurosuke.

Mokuba didn't answer. "I want to know what happened between you and Pegasus," he said. "The truth, not the evasive bullshit you've been feeding me."

Seto turned back to the window, leaned his face against the stone wall.

"I know there's something," Mokuba said quietly. "Please, Seto. Talk to me."

Telling Mokuba would be absolutely irrevocable. He knew this, and yet he was, at that moment, so very tired of huddling. "After I was defeated, he didn't send me to the dungeon. He sent me to the kitchen." He stopped, and listened, and then almost laughed, because of course he wasn't going to hear Mokuba holding his breath, because avatars didn't have breath to hold. "He brought the Big Five to see me, and they ..." He wondered suddenly if customers might buy the option for giving their VR avatars the option to shed tears if the player's body was doing so.

"They did something to you." Mokuba said carefully.

Seto nodded.

"Physical or ... sexual?"

"Classifying such actions is difficult. It's a matter of definition," he said, his words seeming to come from someone else."Denotation and connotation. One's a subset of the other."

"Is this why—" Mokuba started to ask.

"I had Millie install the latest ragdoll physics engine," Seto said. "Optimized realism." He shook his head. "I thought it would help me get back at him."

There was silence, but then Mokuba's avatar came into view. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Seto couldn't stand to meet the eyes of even a virtual representation of his brother, and so bowed his head to look at the dark floor. "You ... you'd never—"

Mokuba made an exasperated sound. "You thought I'd be disgusted and wouldn't want to be around you? About something that was completely out of your control? And people think _you_ got all the brains in the family." The avatar's voice was thick, as if it was crying. "Seto, you idiot, I love you." Mokuba stepped close, hugged him. "You're the most important person in the world to me. I care about what happens to you. I hate seeing you miserable."

Seto forced himself not to twist away and end the program right then.

"It was a probably a good call not to tell me back then," Mokuba continued, finally letting go. "It's not something a twelve-year old can handle. Even a Kaiba. But I'm glad you felt like you could tell me now." He put his hand on Seto's shoulder. "What you just did—telling me about it—I can't imagine how tough this is for you."

"It ... it's a relief to have it out." He wanted the conversation to stop, but knowing Mokuba's tenacity the only thing he could do was to let it run out. Channel it into another topic. "You don't seem surprised. How long have you known?"

"I didn't know. Well, I didn't know for sure. A few years ago there was a television show about … someone who'd been … who had that happen to them. The more I thought about it, it was an explanation for some things about you that have never made sense."

"Such as?"

"Such as why you've stayed in touch with Kurosuke all these years. Or Jounouchi."

Seto half laughed. "There is no logical explanation for Jounouchi." Seto glanced up, then looked away. "What do you mean, he doesn't make sense?"

Mokuba thought for a minute. "When he and Honda found me in Brazil, I was surprised to find out that he'd been living with you." Mokuba winced. "And when he moved out right after I got back, I figured I'd somehow broken the two of you up. I've always felt guilty about that."

"Don't," Seto said. "There was nothing to break up."

"I know. He joked a lot that you let him live with you rent-free because you were too stingy to hire a maid," Mokuba said, "but he's a shitty poker player. I always got the impression there were things he was holding back. Things about the two of you."

Seto had a brief surge of gratitude. "If there was, it's all far in the past."

"Well, okay," Mokuba said. "But if there's ever anything you want to talk about I'm here to listen. You know that, right?"

"Of course." He'd never take Mokuba up on this offer, of course, but he knew how much his brother liked to feel needed.

"I hope the Pegasus' cancer treatment works," Mokuba said unexpectedly.

"Why?" Seto was finally able to look him in the eye.

"So that you can confront him," Mokuba said. "Everything I've read says that you need to do that to," he paused, "to move on with your life. But right now that's impossible, with him being practically comatose."

 _Comatose_. "Consciousness is no obstacle to a Kaiba. Or death, for that matter," Seto said. Why had he not thought of this sooner?

"I don't—oh, I see! Put him in a pod and interact with him in VR?" Mokuba's avatar then looked startled. "Or do you mean upload his mind to a computer? Like Gozaburo did for Noa?"

"Upload." Mokuba's emotions, even without the visual clues of the virtual avatar, were easy to deduce. He still mourned the egotistic, murderous "brother" they'd only ever known through a VR world, a grief that Seto had never been able to understand, but he allowed Mokuba his secret obsession. "Your mementos will be useful." When guilt flashed across Mokuba's face Seto added, "I know you recovered most of Gozaburo's research on the technique." _Including those I came across before you did and re-buried for you to find._

"Will it work?"

Seto shrugged. "Twenty years ago, doing a complete transfer using the primitive technology Gozaburo had then? It's a miracle he was successful." _Although, I'd hardly call such a deeply flawed result a success._ "But now, for me, with a subject like Pegasus? It's trivial."

Nodding, Mokuba said, "And once he's saved to disk it'll let us meet with him when you're ready."

Seto had been momentarily relieved that the conversation had so easily been diverted, but that "us" was worrisome. While telling Mokuba didn't seem to have resulted in the complete disaster he'd been dreading—not yet, at least—he had had his fill of sharing.

He intended to deal with Pegasus on his own.

 

.

.

_~ to be continued ~_

.

.

Author's notes will be posted at LiveJournal and Dreamwidth when the story is complete; for now, here's the playlist I used every time I sat down to work on this chapter:

Samuel Barber, "Adagio for Strings, Op. 11"  
Harold Budd, "Dark Star" and "Abandoned Cities" from _Abandoned Cities_  
Brian Eno, _Neroli_  
Philip Glass, Glassworks 6 - closing, from _Glassworks_  
Jon Hassell, "Brussels" from _The Surgeon of the Night Sky Restores Dead things by the Power of Sound_  
Susumu Hirasawa, "Murder" from the _Berserk_ OST  
Arvo Part, "Tabula Rasa Part 4: Silentium"  
Erik Satie, "Gnossienne No. 1"

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(04) 14 April 2013


	4. Restorations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Virtual Pegasus is on-line—or is he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, grateful thanks to my beta **Dark Rabbit.**

.

. 1 .

Pegasus stands in front of a huge mirror at one end of the dining hall, watching his reflection as he turns his head from side to side. (Of course there is a mirror in the dining hall: according to Kurosuke, there had been—was?—one in every room of the mansion. There had even been an official "catoptricist" on staff whose job was simply to clean every mirror. Every day.)

"I don't usually confide in strangers," he says, smoothing his long hair, "but somehow I feel I can trust you." He pauses in his preening to look back over his shoulder, a gesture clearly meant to show that he is condescending to focus his attention on something other than the mirror for a moment. "I _can_ trust you, can't I?"

The question has been addressed to a young man standing at the far end of the huge dining table. His high-collared black jacket is vaguely military, although his bright red hair and dark blue-grey skin mark him as otherworldly. He doesn't answer right away: he grips the back of the dining room chair and stares down at the polished wood of the tabletop, at a blurry reflection that looks like a corpse trapped beneath muddy ice. "Yes," he tells Pegasus at last. "You can tell me anything."

"I just feel so, so _empty_." Pegasus has turned back to the mirror, touching the patch over his left eye. "As if there's something missing. It's very distressing."

.

. 2 .

"Something on your mind?"

Predictably, Mokuba had appeared at the desert house within hours of Seto's revelation in the VR. Seto had steeled himself to endure a round of hugging and empathy, but rather than smothering Mokuba had simply handed him a battered leather briefcase and then walked past him to make coffee.

Curious (and relieved) Seto opened the briefcase. A thick stack of faded manilla folders, a bundle of backup discs, and a compact external drive. Gozaburo's notes on the transfer process, with Mokuba's analysis of the directory structure and API he used. "This looks like something you did years ago," Seto said.

Mokuba didn't look up from the coffeemaker. "Yeah, I kept hoping—"

Seto understood: Mokuba had never accepted that their virtual "brother" Noa had been lost when the supercomputer containing his scan was destroyed.

"Gozaburo must have had backups," Mokuba said as he took coffee mugs from the cabinet. "But I've never been able to find them. "

Seto wanted to ask why he continued to hope, why he continued to mourn someone so defective, but then the parallel hit him: Mokuba was accustomed to damaged siblings.

.

. 3 .

"It's very kind of you to meet me here," Pegasus says, smoothing his hair a final time before he turns from the mirror. "Wherever _here_ is."

"So nothing about this room is at all familiar to you?" the young man asks.

"Should it be?"

.

. 4 .

He had been grateful for something to concentrate on, and not have to meet Mokuba's eyes or discuss the revelations in any more detail. Based on Gozaburo's notes, they decided that a six-exabyte RAID drive for recording Pegasus would be sufficient. As they reviewed electroencephalograph equipment for making the recording, Mokuba asked quietly, "Do you want to talk to Kurosuke, or do you want me to?"

"Why?"

"Pegasus is his patient."

"Will he interfere?"

"Probably not, but he might have a perspective on the process that we don't."

And so he had allowed Mokuba to call Kurosuke over from the guest house. The old man had listened attentively, nodding his head almost imperceptibly as he stared at the charts and lists and diagrams.

"You probably think this is wrong. Inhuman, even," Seto said bitterly.

"This procedure," Kurosuke asked, "this scan ... if I understand, it will copy his brain completely? So much so that his essence will continue to exist inside the computer even after his body has died?"

"Yes," Seto said. "It's been done several times in the past." He stopped himself from adding _With varying results._

"Will you be able to use the recording to make him account for his crimes?"

Mokuba asked, "Does that bother you?"

"Mr. Crawford has wronged many many people over the years," Kurosuke said, "and yet his skill in choosing his puppets and entangling them in his web, letting them know that if he fell, they would too, has allowed him to evade accountability for his actions." He bowed his head. "I admit with shame I was one such a coward."

Seto didn't wish to have this discussion, but he knew he was the only one who could end it. "No need to beat yourself up," he said. "You did what you could." Careful not to look at Mokuba, he added, "At the very least you saved me."

Kurosuke glanced up at him, and his gratitude was distressingly apparent. "Thank you."

"So, no objections?" Mokuba asked. "Because our lawyers will probably want you to sign something."

"I will sign," Kurosuke said.

"Good. You can go back to your patient." Seto was aware that it was unfair—and possibly unkind—but he still couldn't bear to be in a room with Kurosuke for very long.

As he stood to go Kurosuke said, "If the memory loss is due to physical causes, the process of recording might even," Kurosuke waved his hands, "how to put it? it might bridge over the lacunae."

Seto had heard an unstated condition in Kurosuke's tone. "Amnesia isn't always physical?"

"No, sometimes it is psychogenic. The subconscious _chooses_ to forget. But with this man, there is also the possibility ..." Kurosuke looked thoughtful.

"The possibility of what?"

"That he is simply _pretending_ to have forgotten."

.

. 5 .

"I had a horrible dream," Pegasus says. "I dreamed I was an ugly old man with no hair, who did nothing but sit in a drab room and stare at a dirty window all day."

"What if this room is the dream of an old man?"

"That's a strange, cruel thing to say." Pegasus hugs himself, consoling his reflection. "Why do people always hate the beautiful?"

"They also hate the rich and the talented."

Pegasus turns at last, looking surprised. "Am either of those?"

"Both. This is your mansion."

"Really? And I'm talented as well? At what?"

"Follow me, and I'll show you."

.

. 6 .

"What do you mean?"

"I observed him for many years," Kurosuke said. "At the request of his father I accompanied him on his travels after Cynthia's death—South America, Eastern Europe, Tibet, Egypt—and managed the mundane details of his everyday life."

"Get to the point."

"Even as a child," Kurosuke said slowly, "he was very sensitive to anything harsh or unexpected, always closing his eyes and putting his fingers in his ears or running away when there was shouting in the house. As we traveled he was horrified at how much wealth had insulated him from the realities and random cruelties of life. However, once he received the Eye, the power to control others, to almost sidestep fate itself, obsessed him."

Mokuba shook his head. "But he hasn't had the Eye for years."

"He does, however, have the memories of the things he chose to do when he had it."

"Oh!" Mokuba clearly had had a revelation. "So you think he's _pretending_ to have amnesia to avoid facing the consequences of his actions?"

"Perhaps."

"I don't think he's faking," Mokuba said. "You do know that when we first identified him at the hospital he begged Seto to save him from a mysterious something? He wouldn't have done that if he remembered their past history."

"Or," Kurosuke said carefully, "perhaps he was begging the doctors to save him from your brother's wrath?"

.

. 7 .

They walk from the dining hall down a carpeted hallway, then take an elevator to the top floor of the mansion. The elevator door opens into a large room whose entire ceiling is a slanted bank of glass.

"What a wonderful room!" Pegasus says. "And look at that sky! so very blue!"

"Northern exposure." The young man waves his hand. "Fully stocked with the finest supplies."

All around them are shelves loaded with stacks of thick, pebbly paper and drawing pads; orderly racks of bare canvases and sheets of masonite; neatly-stacked tubes of paint, trays of chalk, colored pencils, drawing pens, markers, and sticks of charcoal; and brushes of every thickness, from eyelash to hand's-breadth.

"Oh." Pegasus walks toward an easel that holds large sheets of paper. "So many things! It's overwhelming. How do people ever learn to use all this?"

"You did."

"I did?" Pegasus says. He picks up a stick of charcoal from a small table next to the easel. "I suppose I must take your word for it, then."

"Try drawing something."

Pegasus turns to look at him. "Only if you pose for me."

.

. 8 .

"What if he never stops pretending?" Mokuba asked.

"He wins," Seto said, furious. "I lose."

"I am not saying for certain whether his memory is lost or not," Kurosuke said. "But if I may suggest something which may prove useful in either case?"

"What?"

"Put him in familiar surroundings," Kurosuke said. "that remind him of happier, less stressful times in his life. Be patient, attentive, and non-threatening. Once he trusts you, he will either regain his memory or drop his guard. One way or another, you will uncover the true Pegasus."

Seto knew, at some level, that Kurosuke was only trying to help, but the suggestion that they be _nice_ to Pegasus was ... no, there was no way. "He won't buy it."

"Not from you, no," Mokuba said, "but what if you're disguised? He's a spoiled egoist. He won't question being the center of attention. He thinks it's his due."

Kurosuke added, "If he's facing not Seto Kaiba—the man he should flee from—but instead a potential new ally that knows nothing about him, he'll see a harmless pawn to charm and manipulate."

Every atom in Seto's body was saying _No_ , but he had to accept the plausibility of what the other two were suggesting. "I'll do it."

"Anyhow," Mokuba said reassuringly. "You won't be alone. I'll be disguised right along with you."

"Don't patronize me!" Seto now knew how animals in steel traps felt, and why they chewed through their own limbs to escape. "I don't need anyone to hold my hand."

"I didn't say you did."

"I forbid you to come."

"Since when are you the boss of me?" Mokuba said. "C'mon, Seto, I have a stake in this too. Pegasus kidnapped me, put my soul in a card, and locked me in a dungeon for days." Before Seto could respond Mokuba added, "But more important, he hurt _you_. No way I'm going to sit out here while you take him on by yourself."

.

. 9 .

As Seto reluctantly sits in a chair Pegasus fusses with the easel, appearing to be surprised that it has a height adjustment.

Very convincing.

When he finally does begin to draw he goes slowly, looking back and forth every few seconds—sometimes scribbling over what he has done, once even ripping the sheet from the easel—but gradually he does this less and less, apparently filling each page with dozens of sketches before turning to a fresh sheet and making more. "You're a wonderful model," he says with a sigh. "It's as if you being here is gifting me with creative abilities. It's exhilarating. You're like a Muse descended from Olympus."

"I have no response to that," Seto says.

The studio returns to silence after that, holding only the scritch of the charcoal and the rustle of paper for several minutes. Then a phone rings.

Mokuba, checking up on him.

"Go ahead and answer that," Pegasus says, setting down the charcoal stick and wiping his fingers on a cloth. "I'm going to try some pastels next, I think."

"Hello," Seto says once Pegasus has walked to the other end of the room.

"Where are you?" Mokuba asks.

"Art studio."

"He's drawing?"

"Yes."

"Not using blood, is he?"

"Not so far."

"You okay?"

"Of course." He hangs up.

"I hope you don't charge by the hour," Pegasus says, coming back with several flat, brightly-colored metal cases. "I'm not sure I could afford you."

"I'm sure you could."

"Oh?" He chuckles. "Oh, that's right. You said I'm rich. Do people hate me because I'm rich?"

 _Not when there are so many other reasons._ "I have no idea."

Pegasus has opened one of the tins. He is drawing something larger now. His motions have become confident, his expression thoughtful. It also seems as though he is selecting each drawing chalk—pastel, whatever they're called—without hesitation. Has he finally decided to drop the pretense?

As Seto watches him work he decides that it had been a mistake not making the artist's VR avatar look as he had during Duelist Kingdom. As he was now, dressed in street clothes, black patch hiding the Millennium Eye (or was it missing?), he was too reminiscent of the Pegasus of Seto's childhood, the fascinating friend who had secretly thrilled him by maintaining their correspondence under Gozaburo's nose. Rationally, of course, this effect is due to the setting and the situation, which were recalling his memories of the day he'd first met Pegasus.

 _No,_ he reminds himself, _he's not my friend. He's the person who destroyed my life._

At last Pegasus says, "Done. Want to see?"

"All right." Seto pushes himself out of the chair and walks over to look.

He has to admit that, whether he is faking or not, the bastard still has command of his talent. The portrait is stylized, and yet seems on the verge of movement and life. "It's good," Seto says, impressed despite himself. "it's very good."

"It is, isn't it?" Pegasus says wonderingly, without a trace of either humbleness or irony. "You've really inspired me. Perhaps it's because ... "

"Because what?" Seto asks.

"Well, I hope you won't be offended," Pegasus says quietly, stepping close to him, "if I say that I find myself unexpectedly drawn to you." He puts a hand on Seto's shoulder, then lets the hand slide down Seto's back to his waist. "You remind me very much of someone I once held dear."

Seto grits his teeth. It had been careless to leave the tactile module in the VR program, but he isn't about to let the lurching, queasy sensations flooding him make him panic and end the program before he has dug out the truth. "Could be because you're drawing me," he says as calmly as he can.

"That's probably it." Pegasus' voice is even softer now, almost a whisper. "Should I continue?"

Seto wonders if Kurosuke and Mokuba are been wrong. Has Pegasus seen through the deception from the beginning? Has he simply been playing the innocent to see how far Seto will go with the charade? There is one way to find out: call the bluff. "Sure."

"Are we still talking about art, Kaiba-boy?" Pegasus asks. "I'd hate to jump to the wrong conclusion and do something uncalled-for."

Seto is stunned. "Pause," he says as he presses a relay hidden in the hem of his jacket. He ducks away from Pegasus and hurries to crouch behind a cabinet as if taking cover from gunfire.

Across the room, the frozen artist, posed as if offering a handshake, has a malicious half-smile.

.

. 10 .

"Fair enough," Seto said grudgingly. "But don't enter the VR until I call for you."

"You shouldn't—"

" _Please_ , Mokuba."

His brother looked shocked, Seto thought, as if he'd never heard Seto say "please" before.

"Okay," Mokuba said, "I promise."

.

. 11 .

The blue rectangles of sky have shaded toward dusk and still he cannot move. It is as if the program has frozen him as well, a swirling cryonic of disgust and hatred ... and yes, exhilaration.

The phone rings.

"Yes?" Even though he knows Pegasus can't hear him, he can't help talking in a near whisper.

"Your readings have been really weird. What's going on?"

"Kurosuke was right. Pegasus didn't lose his memories. He's been faking."

Mokuba growls. "Time for me to come in and—"

"Not yet."

"Why not? Damnit, Seto, _why_?"

He can't explain why. "I'll call you when I'm ready." He hangs up, and then because it feels good, calming somehow, he wedges himself even further into the space behind the cabinet, far enough that Pegasus is no longer in his line of sight.

.

. 12 .

He had found it unexpectedly difficult to pick his disguise. Mokuba kept making suggestions, even locating what he called a "feature deconstruction and randomization program" from a witness protection program, but Seto kept dismissing them for no reason he could quite articulate.

"Your problem is that you think you're perfect as is," Mokuba joked. "So no avatar that isn't _you_ is going to meet your approval."

"Hardly."

Still ...

Late that night, after Mokuba had gone over to the guest house to supervise the setup for the recording, Seto sat down at Mokuba's computer to look through the randomization program. In the directory of previous outputs was a folder labeled _Source_. Curious, Seto clicked to find scans of old photographs. There were dozens from their days at the orphanage, including the smiling one that had gone into their lockets, but there were also a few from their years with Gozaburo. In one, Seto—wearing the white high-collared suit that he had so hated—stood on a stage, holding a trophy he had received for something or other. Unsmiling, clearly contemptuous of the lesser beings around him, impatient to be elsewhere, he stood in a spotlight.

And just beyond the edge of the light, a flash of magenta, clapping and smiling and beaming as if Seto were his own son.

He inverted the colors, applied them to the first randomized face Mokuba's program generated, and then uploaded the results to his pod.

.

. 13 .

"You call for maintenance?" asks a man who has appeared in the studio's doorway. Dressed in jeans, a white t-shirt, and work boots, he has a tool belt slung over one shoulder. "Hey, what you doing back there?"

"Mokuba!" Seto fumes as he storms over. "You promised not to—"

"He didn't break his promise," the stranger says, holding up his hands as if surrendering. "I'm not Mokuba."

"Then who the hell—" Seto starts to demand, a part of him noting that there is something familiar about the way the stranger's shaggy reddish-brown hair is tied back.

"The carpenter thing isn't enough of a clue? Damn." The stranger digs into the neck of his t-shirt, and grinning, pulls out a pendant: an antique ivory _netsuke_ of a dragon, strung on a thin leather lace. "Recognize this?"

Seto grimly takes out the phone and dials his brother.

"Don't be mad," Mokuba says the instant he answers. "I know I said I wouldn't monitor you, but—"

"Why did you involve him in— _a family matter_?" Seto demands.

"He called and offered."

Seto harrumphs as he watches Jounouchi tiptoeing with the exaggerated caution of a cartoon character toward the motionless Pegasus.

Mokuba sighs heavily. "Believe it or not, he'd seen something about Pegasus being found and put under our care, and he's been calling me and asking if there was anything he could do to help."

"Bullshit."

"That part is true." Mokuba is irritated, which meant a welcome directness would follow. "I know you're not gonna want to hear this, but I'm going to say it anyhow. Do you know what Jou told me before he went to Australia? He told me, 'Your brother wants to be really really _really_ close to someone who will leave him completely alone.' It made me laugh, but it's absolutely true, and it convinced me that Jou understands you as well as I do. Not that that's much."

Seto is too annoyed to respond.

"Anyhow," Mokuba continues, "I know what's past is past, but after you told me what happened to you at Duelist Kingdom I called him up, and by dancing around the topic for almost an hour each of us finally caught on that the other knew about it."

"Behind my back."

Mokuba keeps going. "In the end, I told him what we were planning to do and he offered to go to Domino and be on-call in case we needed backup."

"I see."

"Look, whether you believe it or not there are a lot of people who would drop everything to help you," Mokuba adds. "On-line, in-person."

"Vultures."

" _Friends_ , you ass. Deny it all you want, you have them."

"Weird." Jounouchi is muttering. "He looks so _weird._ Does he still have the Eye?" He hurries back over to Seto. "Can he read my mind?"

Seto shakes his head. "Will it stop your interference," he asks Mokuba, "if I allow him to stay?"

"Probably."

"Hn." Seto makes sure to use his _We're ending this conversation now_ tone _._ "Anything else?"

"Can't think of anything at the moment," Mokuba says.

Seto hangs up and motions Jounouchi toward the doorway. "Stay in the hallway for now."

"Okay."

Once Jounouchi is out of sight Seto takes up his position against Pegasus' hand, presses the relay, and says, "Resume program."

 

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.

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_~ To be continued ~_

_**.** _

**A request: If you review**  
(and I do appreciate those that take the time to comment):  
I'd prefer if you please avoid mentioning details of spoilers  
(spoilers generally being anything in the chapter that took you by surprise).

(05) 25 Aug 2013 ~ Eye


	5. Remnants

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto takes a walk, meets an old flame, defines terms, and returns to a crisis.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks go once again to my beta **Dark Rabbit**. I touched this last, though so any errors are mine.

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.

"Pause program," he said immediately, before Pegasus moved.

He wasn't ready.

"Hey," Jounouchi—out of out of sight in the hallway—asked, "how come I don't pause too?"

"External processor." Why was he hesitating? This was something he wanted to do, had been told he _had_ to do, and what he had to say was straightforward: _You were my friend. Yet you let the Big Five … attack me._ He accepted that the act of accusation was the key point, but what he really wanted, what he needed, was to understand why it had happened, and to get some acknowledgement of how his life had been altered—which was unlikely, considering how capricious Pegasus had always been even about trivial matters.

He knew that Pegasus would offer neither justification nor apology, so then why was he was holding back?.

"Huh? What external processor?" Jounouchi was now standing in the open doorway

He was annoyed, but also relieved by the familiar distraction. "You. Your brain. It's not part of the program, it's just passed in as an input."

"Huh. Okay. Like that movie?"

He had to get out of this room, out of this simulation. He stepped away from Pegasus, and without explanation he brushed past Jounouchi and down the hall.

"How long you gonna keep him on pause?" Jou asked, hurrying after him.

"He'll resume when I exit."

"Where are you going?"

"For a walk." It was like babysitting a toddler.

"Want me to leave?"

He stopped, thinking he'd frame something that suitably expressed his annoyance, but it wasn't worth the effort. "You can stay if you talk less."

Jou opened his mouth to reply, stopped himself, grinned, then nodded.

.

The autumn forest he'd created as the setting for the Tantalus program's Ryuken module had been expanded again and again over the years as it became his preferred space for private hiking, and now covered several square kilometers. He'd given his supercomputer's AI Millie control over randomizing the environment so that the trails didn't become stale: as they walked he was pleased to see that her algorithms apparently continued to function flawlessly. Even without a biosuit's enhanced sensory interface the aesthetics were more than adequate.

Jou, true to his word, kept quiet, and stayed a few paces behind him, as if to allow him the illusion that he was alone. Seto supposed that this was meant as a some sort of considerate gesture, but it irritated him, but then, if he were honest, for as long as he could remember almost _everything_ in his surroundings had irritated him.

He had come to understand that the majority of people didn't experience life this way, apparently having high thresholds and low standards for their stimuli. Not that he attached any meaning to this observation: how the masses were hardwired wasn't of interest to him. What _was_ of interest was that his irritation was beginning to extend to Mokuba, to a slowly-increasing resentment of Mokuba's happiness. This phenomenon had at first been difficult to accept, but once he did it was clear that he needed to change his patterns of perception, processing, and behavior before he wound up bitter and isolated.

"A new template," he said aloud.

"Huh?" Jou asked.

There was a rustle in the bushes to the right of the path.

What the –?

A black and brown dog burst through the branches in an explosion of dried leaves.

"You made virtual pets, too?" Jou squatted and held out his hand. "C'mere boy."

Seto felt some apprehension at the unexpected sight of the dog. The dog was very similar to the dog Mille had created for the Lord Ryuken module of Tantalus, the private fantasy VR he'd he'd been obsessed with back in high school, during the months that he'd tried to convince himself that a virtual lover would be superior to a flesh and blood one. He was certain he hadn't loaded the program before transferring the two of them; had he inadvertently tripped one of Mille's triggers?

Jou was now enthusiastically scratching the dog between its ears. "Nice attention to detail: it's almost like I'm pettin' a real dog!"

Shit ... the dog had only appeared in the very early versions of the Ryuken module, when the encounters were outside. If somehow those old files had loaded, then any moment now Ryuken and his troop would appear, and as Ryuken was essentially Jounouchi in feudal clothing …

"I see that Kee has found new whelps for her litter. Or are these bear cubs too young to escape up a tree?"

... and there they were, all of them, including Ryuken, his face fortunately concealed by an iron helm.

One of the women said, "They do say, my lord, that some of the trees in this wood bear strange blossoms."

"Vagrants," Ryuken said. "Arrest them."

"Now wait just a minute, Sir Whatever-your-name is!" Jounouchi said.

"I am Lord Ryuken, ruler of these lands," Ryuken said as he took off his helm. "I punish those who trespass in my forest."

Jounouchi did a double take and then started laughing. "Oh, is that right? Well, this is gonna be fun—I've never kicked my own ass before!"

"Do you mock me?" Ryuken asked coldly.

"Nah, nah," Jounouchi said, holding up his hands. "I was kidding."

Ryuken, not programmed for this input, stood glowering.

"So you cloned me." Jounouchi said, cocking his head. "It's a pretty good likeness. When did you do it?"

"Back in high school," Seto said. He couldn't tell if Jounouchi was insulted or flattered. "It never worked the way I wanted it to."

"Aw, that sucks—wait! He said he punishes trespassers?" Jounouchi was now gleeful. "Was it, like, _special_ punishment?" He waggled his eyebrows. "Sexy punishment?"

"End program," Seto said. "Override. Arc-NULL-3."

As Ryuken, his troop, and the dog faded, Jounouchi said, "Hey, don't be embarrassed. I used to practice making out with my pillow." He added with a final chuckle, "Of course, I was like _eight,_ but still."

There was no adequate response to this, so Seto turned and began walking.

However unexpected Ryuken's appearance had been, it did underscore that all he was accomplishing at the moment was delaying the conversation with Pegasus. He analyzed the reason for this: was he apprehensive, under-prepared? No, it wasn't that, Mokuba had sent him plenty of resources. It was ...

Everyone had acted as though the confrontation would be the solution to everything. Didn't they see how flawed that assumption was? So he'd go in, make his accusations—and then what? "It won't change anything," he said.

Jounouchi stopped, turned. "What?"

He hadn't meant to speak aloud. "Talking. To him."

As always, Jou's facial expressions made his thoughts transparent: the current one was _Crap, I don't know how to handle this kind of thing!_ "It might."

Seto huffed.

"Look," Jou said, now with _This is some serious shit right, but I can handle it_ , "This thing that happened? It's been eating away at you for years, like poison. When you told Mokuba—well, that brought it out in the light, which was good."

"Light has no effect on poison," Seto pointed out.

"Always so technical!" Jounouchi said, rolling his eyes. "You know what I meant. Point is, making him own it changes it from something that happened to you, to something _he_ did."

Nonsensical semantics. "And then what?"

"And then you can get your life back to normal," Jounouchi said.

So he, like Mokuba, obviously wanted to believe that a single conversation would magically resolve everything, so that they could stop feeling uncomfortable around him. He was a to-do list item: _Get rid of guilt over not being attacked by "helping" Kaiba._ "So that's my goal? Normalcy?"

"Whatever normal means for you, yeah. You've always been pretty far ahead of the average guy, and the shit that's gone on in your life has just added to that." He shrugged. "You've skipped a lot of stuff that other people do, but it's not important unless there's something you _want_ to do but can't." He stopped, nudged Seto. "So figure out what makes you happy, and do it."

"Happy."

"Yeah, happy. That thing where you have fun and feel good and smile?"

"Hn." Mokuba had been telling him for years that he'd stopped smiling after they left the orphanage. He hadn't truly laughed either: _schadenfreude_ didn't count. But how was he supposed to figure out what would bring happiness? Simply do what everyone else was doing? Was the only way to be happy to follow the lemmings, find "normal" where the bell curve bulged with overwhelming numbers? He assumed that part of "normal" was being in a relationship, having sex, but his past attempts hadn't been anywhere near optimal. Which Jounouchi well knew.

As if he was reading Seto's thoughts Jou winced, "Look, I know it's not your way to ask for help, but a professional might be able to help you sort stuff out better than I can."

"A therapist? The media—"

"It ain't none of the media's business," Jou interrupted. "And anyhow, a legit therapist'll guarantee confidentiality. They take an oath or something."

"You've gone to one?"

"Me? No, I..." He shrugged. "I just went around with different people until everything felt right."

 _And I was wrong._ It wasn't an unexpected assessment. "Does your ... person ... approve of you being here?" Who was Jounouchi "going around" with, anyhow?

"They don't know details, but yeah, when I said I needed to help a friend they pushed me out the door."

Seto couldn't suppress his snort of disbelief.

"Ya know, that worked in high school." Jounouchi said, but he was cheerful, not angry. "Acting like you don't believe that anyone but Mokuba gives a shit about you. C'mon. You know better."

He wasn't going to admit it, but he'd been coming to realize that his past experiences with so-called "friendship" had been atypical, and had colored his objectivity to the point where he likely had rejected what should have counted as empirical evidence. Add to that the concept that, as far as he understood it, friendship was supposed to be reciprocal, and understandably he was reluctant to go up against people who had years of practice. It was not an enjoyable thought, that he might never learn to correctly interpret social interactions.

Still, to avoid it was cowardice. "Mokuba told me ... that you kept my secret even from him. I appreciate your discretion."

"Heh, betcha didn't think I could keep my mouth shut for that long." Even in profile Jou's grin was an enjoyable thing to see.

"You're the one saying it." Seto said.

"When it's something important, I can keep it zipped."

They walked for a while longer—just because they could—then Seto said. "Mokuba wants to be there."

"It's your decision," Jounouchi said, shoving his hands deep in his pockets and staring down at his shoes. "But yeah, I think it's a good idea to have family around for something like this." He glanced over. "You should take Mokuba instead of me. I mean, I'd be honored to back you up, but I don't wanna intrude."

"Don't be ridiculous," Seto said. He pulled out his phone. "Mokuba—"

"I was about to call you," Mokuba said as soon as he answered. "Kurosuke says that we need to airlift Pegasus to the hospital as soon as we can."

"Why?"

"Apparently the experimental treatment was a little too aggressive. He's stable, but his brain activity and vital signs have been getting weaker and weaker."

Seto's first thought—irrational though he knew it to be—was that Pegasus' consciousness had somehow remained connected to his VR image, was somehow driving his avatar in the VR world the way a user would from a pod, and that he was trying to use death to escape accountability by erasing his image. Which was, of course, ridiculous: the physical connection had been removed after the copy was made. Pegasus' consciousness couldn't possibly have any control over the copy on the computer, and what happened to his physical body mattered even less.

And yet Seto felt an irrational imperative to confront Pegasus while his body was still alive in the real world. He didn't understand why it felt important it just _did_.

"How soon does he need to be taken?" he asked.

"Now, pretty much," Mokuba said. "Before there's a medical crisis we can't handle at the house. I've already got the 'copter on standby."

"See to it," he said, "then join me."

There was a pause as Mokuba processed this request. "Any particular avatar you want me to use?"

"No," Seto said. "Come as yourself. There has been enough hiding."

.

.

_~ To be continued ~_

.

Author's note: Rather than post the conclusion of the story in one huge chapter, I'll be breaking it down into smaller, more digestible chunks. ~ Next up: the confrontation with Pegasus.

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(07) 21 Aug 2013


	6. Confrontations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto confronts Pegasus at last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, grateful thanks to my beta Dark Rabbit.

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Pegasus was not in the studio, but it seemed he'd been busy.

The portrait Pegasus had painted on Kaiba's previous visit been placed so that it faced the door. Behind it, three more easels had been set up.

"That's different," Mokuba said, eying the portrait's bright red hair and dark blue-gray skin.

"That's the way Kaiba looked before," Jounouchi said as they walked around to the other paintings.

The first easel held a small canvas covered with overlapping shapes of red and brown.

"I hope he's not back to painting with bodily fluids," Mokuba said.

"Body fluids?" Jounouchi said. "That's goin' overboard with the realism."

The next picture was surrealistic, even grotesque: a filthy animal-headed man, his naked body covered with sores and bleeding lash-marks, crouched in a cage, pulling at his furred genitals..

"That's ... geez, who'd want _that_ over their fireplace?" Jounouchi shook his head.

The last easel held what seemed to be a second portrait of Kaiba's previous avatar, but now stylized and distorted into a bald androgyne. The angular features had been delineated in red, and the shadows on the elongated neck were a rusty reddish-brown the color of dried blood.

"He works fast," Mokuba said. "But where is he?"

"The only other space defined in the program is the dining hall downstairs."

As they got in the elevator, Mokuba asked, "Which floor?"

Seto looked at him, then saw: although he'd only programmed two—the art studio and the dining hall—there were now _three_ buttons. It could have been a glitch, but more likely Pegasus was learning how to expand the virtual space by drawing on memories.

"Down one," Seto said. Whatever Pegasus had lurking in the basement could wait.

.

As the elevator doors opened they heard faint laughter.

"He's got visitors?" Jounouchi said.

"Unlikely he has enough control of the environment to create animated figures yet," Seto said as they started down the hall.

"Yet? What do you mean, _yet_?" Jounouchi asked. There was an edge of nervous concern that recalled the jumpy teenager he'd been. "Is he gonna try to kill us? Like Noa did?"

"Immaterial," Seto said. "I can end the program at any time."

Pegasus sat at the table in the dining hall—his usual place near the mirror—reading a book. On the table was a bottle, a tray of cheese, and a stack of _Funny Rabbit_ comics. As he turned to face them Seto saw that his ability to manipulate the environment had allowed him to modify his appearance: he now looked as he had at Duelist Kingdom, down to the Millennium Eye.

Pegasus set his book down. "Well, this is a surprise. I was hoping for that intriguing boy from earlier. He had such _presence_." He smiled, then let it fade to a baleful glare. "Really, Kaiba-boy, did you think a simple color inversion would fool _me_? I can even guess what you used as a color reference—a picture from that ceremony that had the key lights with the hideous gels that made your hair look green. Am I right? Tell me I'm right!"

"You knew it was me."

"Of _course_ I knew it was you," Pegasus snapped. "Just as I know you've taken what's left of me and crammed it into one of your virtual spaces, the way Gozaburo did to his beloved son Noa." He took a _Funny Rabbit_ from the stack, turned to the first page. "Preserved for all time. I'm touched."

"I did it because I have things to say to you." Seto said, folding his arms.

"Yes, I noted the trio of serious faces," Pegasus said. "Am I in trouble?" He turned the page.

Jounouchi made a _tch_ of disgust.

"You," Pegasus said, giving Jounouchi an appraising sideways look, "aren't you that scrappy little fellow with the blind sister who took down Howard and his noisy machines at my tournament?"

Jounouchi folded his arms and shrugged.

"I understand you've been keeping busy doing carpentry and sailing in Australia." It was clear that this comment was meant to let them know that he'd kept track of their movements. "Manual labor certainly has paid you _handsome_ dividends. It's no wonder Kaiba-boy hired you to be his ... _muscle_." His tone, as usual, was slick with innuendo. "And how is your dear sister?" he asked. "Does she still see everything clearly?"

"None of your business," Jounouchi muttered.

"Off-topic," Mokuba said just as quietly.

"I'm here as Kaiba's friend," Jounouchi said firmly, "but feel free to keep thinking of me as a bodyguard. Who ain't gonna let you get away with your usual shit."

"Well, aren't you thuggish," Pegasus said, chuckling. "Your taste in friends certainly has changed, Seto."

"Thanks to you."

"Me? Really?" Pegasus set down the comic, then folded his hands in a pose of exaggerated attentiveness. "Do tell me—what was it that I did that provided such clarity?"

"When I first met you I admired you," Seto began. Mokuba had sent him to a website that advocated writing a letter as a rehearsal for a confrontation with a perpetrator, and while he hadn't thought much of that suggestion, the guidelines of points to be covered had seemed reasonable: _What you did to me, How it has affected my life, How I feel about what you did, How I feel about you, What I want you to do about it._

"It was so sweet," Pegasus said.

"Over the years you changed," Seto continued. "Ishizu claims it was the Eye that twisted you. She's wrong. All it did was give you a convenient excuse to be a criminal."

Pegasus scoffed. "Really, Seto, I might have been a bit ruthless in my business practices, but—"

"You drove a wedge between Gozaburo and myself," Seto said, determined to finish before Pegasus could derail him, "and when you found you could not control me you began to work against me. Kidnapping my brother, conspiring to take over my company, cheating when we dueled, and finally standing by while five men who hated me beat and— _raped_ me." The word tore through his throat.

Pegasus went entirely still, as if his program had frozen, but after a moment he laughed. "What an imagination you have!" He looked out the window, as if admiring the pixels of the unchanging, featureless sky.

"No," Seto said, deadly calm. "I am not imagining. I am remembering. Remembering you drinking wine and doing nothing as they—" Once was enough: he couldn't say it again. "Remembering how you turned the lights out and left me in the dark." He peripherally registered that Mokuba and Jounouchi had moved to stand shoulder to shoulder with him.

Pegasus shook his head. "What dramatic accusations."

"Admit the truth."

"I can't. It's _not_ true. A delusion, a slander," Pegasus said smoothly. "Understandably pathetic, but all untrue."

"Says you," Jounouchi said.

"Come now, Seto," Pegasus said. "Isn't this story about being assaulted while a guest in my home simply another illustration of the way you have always escaped into fantasy whenever you couldn't handle reality?"

He had expected this: that Pegasus would deny everything, that he would try to twist the conversation off-topic.

"It's heartrending," Pegasus continued. "You can't accept that I'm dying, and so you're desperate to hold on to any scrap of the deep bond between us."

"Are you fucking clueless?" Jounouchi asked. "Kaiba hates you."

"Really? Then why all this?" Pegasus waved his hand to indicate the room. "Does it make sense to re-create my mansion just for one conversation?"

"Whatever it takes," Mokuba said, "to get closure and move on."

Pegasus smiled. "How quaint that you think that's what this is all about." He took the bottle of wine, unsealed it, and began to open it with a corkscrew that appeared in his hand. "Moving on is the _last_ thing your brother wants. With me captive in his computer, he can finally act on the crush he had when he was a teenager."

"Crush? What deluded vanity." Though it was an irrational reaction, Seto felt his face burning as Mokuba glanced at him. True, his feelings toward Pegasus had always been too complex to sum up in a single word—but even if they had, _crush_ certainly would not have been that word.

"Have you ever told Mokuba about the swimming lesson?" Pegasus asked, pulling the cork out with a pop.

"There was no reason." What a manipulative bastard, to bring that up now—but then, when had Pegasus ever been otherwise?

"Swimming?" Mokuba asked him.

"Oh, how very interesting," Pegasus said. He was gloating. "I can see by your expression that Seto never told you the story." He paused to pour a glass of wine. "Your brother was in Budapest with Gozaburo, some chess event or business conference or such. Well, as it turned out that I was also in the city, at a very exclusive hotel nearby. When Seto found out he begged me to meet him at one of the city's bathhouses—the water comes from geothermal springs, you know, they're therapeutic and quite delightful—ostensibly to teach him to swim. The lesson didn't go as planned. Or perhaps it did, hmmm?"

"Is any of this true?" Mokuba asked.

"Yes," Seto said. As usual, Pegasus was taking something that had been entirely innocent and was making it sound perverse.

"But Gozaburo had forbidden it," Pegasus said.

"He didn't want you to learn how to swim?" Jounouchi asked. "Why? Swimming's fun, and it's good exercise. And comes in handy if you ever get shipwrecked."

"He said anything that didn't teach me how to increase company profits was a waste of time," Seto said bitterly. Gozaburo had also said many other things when Seto had made that particular request, things he wasn't going to repeat.

"Seto had managed—in his typical rule-flaunting way—to allow us use of one of the smaller spas at the ungodly hour of 3 am." Pegasus paused to sip from the wineglass, then made a face. "Ugh, that's as hideously tasteless as the cheese. Oh well." He set the glass down. "The lesson went along quite well—I might even say _swimmingly_ —for a while, but then the clandestine, intimate atmosphere and the physical contact … had an effect on him." Pegasus sighed. "I rebuffed him, of course, but gently: after all, he was only fifteen. Awkward, repressed adolescents can be so _fragile_ emotionally."

Of course, the way Pegasus was telling it was entirely distorted—it had been late evening, not 3 am, and certainly no one had made a pass at anyone—but he suspected that a protest was exactly what Pegasus was trying to goad him into. And he was not going to cooperate.

Plus, Mokuba and Jounouchi ought to know bullshit when they heard it.

"Seto, tell them what happened next." Pegasus had a faint smile.

It was masterfully played. Staying silent would leave an opening for Pegasus to fill with more lies, while answering would make it look as though he was obeying Pegasus ... still, better to provide the information himself. "Gozaburo arrived."

"He attacked me! With a rapier! Hidden in his walking stick!" Pegasus said. "He stormed in and sliced my arm down to the bone! Severed tendons and muscles, damaged the nerve. Left an _enormous_ scar." He lifted a hand to his shoulder and massaged it, as if it still pained him even in the virtual world. "I've had lingering weakness in that arm ever since."

Seto almost laughed at the melodramatic absurdity of the performance.

"But that's far in the past," Pegasus said. "I've quite forgiven everyone involved. I only brought it up to prove how close Seto and I were."

"I don't believe any of this," Mokuba said. "I hardly ever heard Seto mention you when we were growing up."

"Of course not," Pegasus said. "I was, by necessity, a secret friend: from our first meeting Gozaburo strongly disapproved of me. Then too, you only saw each other, what? A quarter of an hour a day? And then only if he'd performed to Gozaburo's satisfaction?" Pegasus sighed. "Although he never said so, I always had the impression that, except for his interactions with you, the atmosphere in the Kaiba household was extremely unloving. From the moment he entered that mansion Seto was chronically starved for attention. Did you know that not being able to visit you always hurt him more than any of the physical abuse he received?"

"You know, it's pretty fucking rude to talk about someone as if they're not right here," Jounouchi said.

"Using vulgar language is also quite rude," Pegasus said coldly.

"Is there a point to all this?" Mokuba asked.

"My point," Pegasus replied, "Is that it's not surprising that Seto fixated so strongly on me, his only uncensored contact with the outside world, and that as he got older—and churning hormones came into play—"

Jounouchi laughed. "Get over yourself."

"—I began to star in his sexual fantasies as well. It's basic psychology," Pegasus said, folding his arms. "Gozaburo had forbidden Seto to have any contact with me. Teenagers need to rebel. Seto and I already had a bond. Unfortunately, his upbringing was such that he likely also felt intense shame over his homoerotic fantasies, and so, with such tidal conflicts pulling at him—well, it's no wonder that he abdicated responsibility by shifting the blame to me. He couldn't accept his orientation, his attraction, and so he invented false memories that cast me as some sort of … _monster._ "

"You _are_ a monster," Mokuba said.

"And if there's anything false here, it's you!" Jounouchi snapped. "If nothing happened, how come Kaiba had cuts and bruises for _weeks_ after Duelist Kingdom?"

Seto knew he could shut everyone up by ending the program, but to do so would be conceding the game to Pegasus, and that he was not going to do.

"Oh, really?" Pegasus raised his eyebrows. " _Weeks_ later, you say? Did you truly accept his explanation for how he got those—whatever injuries you say he had?" Pegasus shook his head pityingly. "Such a naive, trusting person you must have been! Too young to grasp what someone more mature and worldly would have quickly comprehended."

"Which was?"

"That Kaiba-boy was too embarrassed to admit to you that he had had an encounter with—is the correct term still 'rough trade'? I've long suspected that Gozaburo's collar and Hobson's riding crop might have given him less-than vanilla preferences in the bedroom."

"Shut up!" Mokuba said furiously. "Just _shut the fuck up_. He was attacked. In your kitchen. There were witnesses. There's evidence. There are people willing to testify. You're going to pay for what you did."

"These witnesses ... I presume they will be well paid for their testimony?" Pegasus asked.

"At least one will do it for free," Seto said darkly.

"Oh." Pegasus seemed surprised, but only for a moment. "Well, I hardly see the feasibility of pressing charges now, with my physical body dead?"

"It's not dead yet," Seto responded, and it seemed that Pegasus flinched.

"I don't really understand how this virtual reality stuff works," Jounouchi said slowly, "but the part of him that's _here_ probably could get put in a virtual prison, right? Which someone would have to program? Phew, talk about rough trade."

"Oh, _that's_ noble," Pegasus sputtered. "Bully someone who can't fight back! Easy to make threats when it's three against one."

"Better odds than you gave me," Seto said. Seeing Pegasus' smug facade crack was satisfying.

"I don't understand," Pegasus said. "This horrible thing you _claim_ happened doesn't seem to have had any effect on you. The only time you've been observably different were those years when your precious Mokuba was missing—I do hope you don't blame _me_ for his defective aircraft?—and even then all you did was get tipsy and crash your car. Furthermore," Pegasus continued, gaining momentum, "You've received many awards and honorary degrees, had an active social life … I even heard a rumor that you had a live-in lover for several years. Of course, one can't believe _everything_ one hears, I suppose."

"That's true," Mokuba said. "There are a lot of liars in the world."

"Despite a few dips here and there in your company's stock, you have never been anything less than wildly successful financially. You've expanded your parks, built an entertainment complex in downtown Domino—"

"You're very well-informed for someone who's had amnesia for the past decade," Mokuba said.

Pegasus, studying his fingertips, pretended not to have heard. "So tell me, Seto," he asked. "What exactly is wrong with your life?"

He had had enough of being on the defensive, was fed up with the way Pegasus had subverted the discussion with his outrageous claims—claims that contained just enough truth to sound plausible—but there was one thing that Pegasus seemed to have forgotten: he had always been willing to do anything in his power not to lose. "Since that night," he said. "I can't stand being physically close. To anyone. Or being touched. At all. Even by ... family members."

Pegasus looked shocked, then laughed. "Are you truly back to trying to pin that on _me_? I thought we'd all agreed to blame Gozaburo."

Jounouchi shook his head. "You're un- _fucking_ -believable. We know you did it. Just confess already, you scumbag."

"Is that really all you wanted to accomplish with this virtual world, Seto?" Pegasus asked. "Other than creating a convenient target for your dysphoria, that is?" He held up his hands in mock surrender. "Fine. Yes, yes, I did it! It was wrong, I was bad. I was a bad, bad man. Satisfied?"

"It's a miracle," Seto said, angrier than he'd been in years. "Just like that, the magic words fix everything, and I get to go back to being normal."

"What on earth did you expect?"

"For you admit what you did, and explain why," Seto said.

"And apologize," Mokuba added. "A _real_ apology, not lip service."

"No, that will never happen," Seto said. "He's always been a selfish, self-centered child. Unable to understand anyone's pain but his own."

"That's hardly fair!" Pegasus protested. "I have always felt very protective of you, Seto. Like a brother. Or a father."

"Yeah, right," Jounouchi said.

"It's true!" Pegasus shot back. "I mourned the loss of our friendship after Gozaburo died."

"Mourned?" Seto asked. It was foolish to let himself be sucked back into such a pointless conversation, but he couldn't resist a parting jab. "So it was _grief_ that made you give away the Blue Eyes cards you'd designed for me?"

"Well, no that was ... I was _very_ annoyed with you at the time," Pegasus admitted. "But I was designing a new card to make up for it."

"Yeah, right," Jounouchi said again.

"It's true!" Pegasus looked around, then picked up one of his _Funny Rabbit_ comics and turned to a page that was nearly blank. "Here, I'll even paint on this panel—they're lost in a snowstorm, it's hilarious! Anyhow, I had it all planned out in my head." He dipped the tip of his finger in the wine and rapidly sketched on the page, a pinkish calligraphy.

"He can make a corkscrew outta the air, but not a pencil?" Jounouchi muttered. "That doesn't make sense."

"I was going to call it _Friendship's Embrace,_ " Pegasus said. _._ "It would have been a tribute summon, played on any card currently in defense mode. Both cards would switch to attack mode, with the attack and defense values combined, although I never could decide if both cards should be removed from play when defeated or at the end of one turn ... something too overpowered can unbalance the entire game."

"I don't want anything of yours," Seto said. "End pro—"

"Wait, wait!" Pegasus said. Don't you want to see?" He turned the page around. "Sorry it's so poorly drawn. Imagine an ancient tomb setting. Torches in the background, that sort of thing."

The wine had dried to a blue-violet as it evaporated, leaving a picture that, though stylized, was unequivocal in its depiction. On a bed-sized dais two nude figures reclined, their lower bodies hidden by draped fabric. In the foreground, a short-haired young man slept. Behind him, a long-haired man was propped up on one elbow, caressing the sleeper's shoulder.

Seto turned away.

"Don't go!" Pegasus pleaded. "Please, I don't want to go into the dark alone!"

"End program," Seto said.

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_~ To be continued ~_

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_._

(07) 27 Aug 2013 ~ additional tweaks


	7. The Fate of the Fallen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The last meeting of Seto Kaiba and Pegasus.

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He disengaged from the sensors and lay on his side, grateful for the silence.

He was in no hurry to leave the pod. With Mokuba at the California Kaibaland, Jounouchi at the one in Domino, and Kurosuke presumably at the hospital with Pegasus, he was not only alone in the house, but quite likely the only human being for miles in every direction. For the first time in a long time, he found that idea less than enjoyable.

He took out his phone. Kurosuke had texted him an hour ago: _P_ s _table but declining._ "Still not dead?" He muttered. "Such a tenacious bastard." He considered calling Mokuba, but he knew that his brother would ask what he planned to do next, and he had no answer. Certainly what he wanted to do at the moment was obliterate Pegasus by destroying the recording, but objectively that was too reactive, fueled by emotion. If he erased only the new data that Pegasus had written to the disk in the past few hours—the virtual Pegasus's "memory" of what had just happened—it would reset the encounter and he could confront him again, but unless he changed the variables, the initial conditions, it wasn't likely to change the outcome. It was axiomatic: if an equation remains the same, so does its solution. That left Jounouchi's suggestion of punishing Pegasus by tossing him in prison—which was appealing, as was the lingering temptation to use the Freaky House—but coerced contrition wasn't going to feel like victory. He needed to feel as though Pegasus was being genuine, but if that wasn't ever going to happen ...

 _Was Pegasus right?_ Seto wondered. _Am I looking for excuses to keep him around?_

_._

When he finally opened the pod, the late afternoon sun outside the bedroom's wall of windows had polarized the landscape into a monochrome of red and shadow. As he stood in the house's sleek chrome and granite kitchen waiting for the cheap plastic coffeemaker to stop gurgling, he thought of what a waste of money the lease had been: five bedrooms (only one had been used), six bathrooms (five unused), three fireplaces (never lit). Eight thousand square feet in the main house, and he'd used at most a few hundred. He supposed it had been worth it for the guest house and the helicopter pad. And Mokuba had used the pool house.

When his coffee was done he walked across to the guest house. It was empty, of course, the supplemental caretakers had gone to the hospital or simply left, their assigned deathwatch over. The signs that the house had been recently occupied—a dish dotted with breadcrumbs next to the kitchenette's sink, a speckled banana in a fruit bowl on the table; a throw rug bunched into rippled disarray as if by a hasty retreat—amplified Seto's sense of isolation. In the sickroom, a single monitor steadfastly drew flat-lines and displayed zeroes. Next to the bed, a beige pitcher and cup, each half-full of tepid water, had been marooned on the nightstand along with a battered entertainment magazine. And the bed ... the bed was empty. His visual cortex analyzed the pattern of wrinkles on the sheet, trying to resolve them onto an outline of the body that had been there, but of course that was pointless. It was random.

He pulled the sheets from the bed and threw them to the floor.

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After a shower and more coffee—Mokuba had called but not left a message, and now wasn't picking up—he sat down at the computer. The hot water had cleared his mind, and he'd decided to reset the encounter: going in alone should be enough of a change to yield a different outcome.

He opened the dining room to reference the parameters for the reset, but it was empty; even the wine and _Funny Rabbit_ comics were gone. He pulled up the art studio.

Pegasus was painting. He'd changed his appearance yet again: now he had two human eyes—no Eye, no eyepatch—and looked young, even teen-aged. He was wearing a casual shirt and pants with suspenders.

Seto steepled his fingers. Assuming Pegasus' previous appearance—red suit and golden Eye—had been intended to intimidate by evoking his menacing Duelist Kingdom persona, this latest change was trying to accomplish—what? The opposite? To appear as nonthreatening as possible, like a dog scraping its belly on the ground? Was this deception intended to lure Seto back in? No, most likely it was meaningless. Still ... curious to see what Pegasus was playing at, he decided to postpone the reset. As long as he kept in mind that everything Pegasus did and said was a lie, a charade calculated to hide his true self from his audience, he was safe.

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He zoned into the hallway outside the art studio, but Pegasus was gone. "Hide-and-seek?" he muttered, turning and heading for the elevator. He assumed that Pegasus had continued to create new spaces, but surprisingly the elevator had no new buttons: there were still three—top floor art studio, middle floor dining room, and the unlabeled bottom level. He pushed it.

When the elevator doors opened he thought he'd traveled back in time. It had been almost twenty years since he had seen these stone walls, heard the snap of flickering torches, and yet it was as if it had all happened yesterday. There was no odor in the VR dungeon, of course, but his memory filled in what he remembered so well, the damp stink of stale air and rotting moss. The dead-end corridors and blind stairwells were eerily familiar—although sadly, there were no guards to knock unconscious—and as he descended a set of curved stairs he knew he was in the lowest level of the dungeon, near the cell in which Mokuba had been imprisoned. The bleakest day of Seto's life, the day he had watched helplessly as Pegasus took his brother's soul, the day he had threatened suicide to rescue what was precious to him, the day he had—.

The cell was occupied. An old man wearing striped pajamas that looked like an old-fashioned prison uniform sat with his back to Seto. His frail-looking skull was dusted with silvery-grey stubble.

"Pegasus?"

The man twisted to look back over his shoulder, and Kaiba recoiled. Pegasus' uncovered left eye was a bony void, and the right ... the right was a bloody mess of tissue.

"What is this?" Seto asked, angrily reminding himself that in a virtual world injuries were illusion. "Do you think making yourself disgusting will force me to leave you in peace?"

"I don't deserve to be left in peace," Pegasus said. "I was hoping you'd come back. Did you see my latest paintings?"

"No."

"Oh, you didn't look at them?" Pegasus sighed. "I wish you had."

"End pro—"

"No!" Pegasus pleaded. "Wait! Don't erase me yet! I just ... I didn't think you'd return so soon. I haven't had time to rehearse. Give me five minutes." He turned around to face Seto, then wiped his face with his sleeve. "It's funny what we take for granted, isn't it? When I was young I never gave a thought to why people were always so eager to pay attention to me. I realize now it was because of my money and my looks. People were always telling me I was _le visage beau_ , a _shayna punim_ , a _biseinen_." He coughed. "They'd run screaming if they saw me now, wouldn't they?"

"You asked me to listen. I'm listening. Four minutes left," Seto said.

"I took out my other eye to illustrate a point," Pegasus said. "In ancient Greek tragedy, Oedipus tears out his eyes when he realizes that he's unknowingly fulfilled the prophecy that he would kill his father and marry his mother. Most people feel sorry for Oedipus, say he was doomed because of Fate, but I disagree. Oedipus doomed _himself_. Yes, his path was foretold, but at every step he _chose_ that path."

"Is this a literature lecture or an audition?"

"Like Oedipus I too, with my precious eyes, was at first blind to the corruption of my own life," Pegasus said. "From the moment I received the Eye I sensed it housed a Presence, a dark spirit always urging me in certain directions, goading me to certain actions."

"Three minutes left," Seto said.

"But the _compass_ was mine," Pegasus said. "The _decisions_ were mine. I _chose_ to become an Adept of the Eye, a priest of darkness."

"Adept of the Eye?" Seto scoffed. "How pompous. You cheated at cards."

"No," Pegasus said. "It was much more than that. To plumb any mind I choose, reveal its deepest secrets and inner workings? Quite advantageous for business negotiations—and yet that power was insignificant compared to the Soul Prison. Once I mastered _that_ I felt godlike."

"Yes, I remember that trick," Seto said. "If that is what it means to be a god, then I am happy never to have been one."

Pegasus hunched over, bowing his head. "But that was the thing! You weren't _supposed_ to remember! You'd never remembered before!"

"Before?" Seto demanded. "What _before?"_ He felt a memory awakening in the depths, rising massive and dark, like a sea monster swimming up from the abyss. "You did that to me more than once?"

"Well, of course! I had to," Pegasus said, sounding petulant. "How else could I make sure that I would do it perfectly when Cynthia appeared again?"

"When? How many times?" Seto was newly shaken: what if there were other things he had forgotten?

"The day I made the Blue Eyes cards for you," Pegasus said, "I discovered that I could bind her soul to the physical plane. A piece of the body, a net for the soul. And I had a locket with some of her hair ..."

And now Seto understood. Pegasus had incorporated strands of hair into the Blue Eyes cards, not to make the cards unique, but to make them suitable for ... trial runs. "So you—who else did you practice on? _Mokuba?"_ he demanded, clenching his fists. He didn't care if Pegasus was now a weak, disfigured old man dying in hospital, or that it had all happened twenty years before: he would beat him to death if he'd harmed Mokuba ...

"Of course not," Pegasus said, wiping his face again. "By the time of Duelist Kingdom I had already perfected the technique." He chuckled. "I was so naive! Stealing your hair!—though it made sense according to the nursery rhyme the voice recited to me."

Seto was taken aback. Pegasus had always been odd, annoyingly—even infuriatingly—so, but always there had been a keen intelligence evident. A method to his madness. Now, with this talk of blinded kings and spirits and voices Pegasus seemed pathetically disordered.

"Later I found out where to get a particular variety of arenite in the Valley of the Kings," Pegasus said, "the exact type of sandstone the ancients had used for their sacred tablets. When I ground it to fine powder and coated the background of the card—" He stopped. "Well, never mind. With you, I was still learning, you see. I made mistakes. That's why you changed."

"Changed? What do you mean?"

"I didn't realize it at first, of course, but I was inadvertently stranding a piece of your soul in each card," Pegasus said. "I did intend to put them back, but ... well, you made me angry, so I didn't."

"Ridiculous." He folded his arms. "You are confusing reality with the plot of a fantasy book. The Blue Eyes are not horcruxes."

"It's _not_ ridiculous. You were frantic to get the cards back after I gave them away."

"Of course. They were the most powerful cards available at that time," Seto said. "I needed to have them to win."

"No," Pegasus said. "Almost from the instant I made the cards you became almost inhumanly ruthless. You lost all empathy for others. You drove Gozaburo and that other man to suicide. "

"It was Gozaburo's choice to jump out that window," Seto said.

"That's a rationalization, Kaiba-boy, and we both know it," Pegasus said. "You're as guilty as if you'd pushed him with your own hands. You manipulated his most trusted advisers until they turned against him."

"Trusted advisers too easily swayed by money and promises of power," Seto said. "But then you know all about how easily they could be swayed."

Pegasus was silent.

"It's ironic, Pegasus," Seto said, "that after all you've done you call _me_ the heartless one."

"You're right, of course," Pegasus said. "I've lost count of how often I've wished I could go back in time and undo the wrongs I've done. I committed sins that no one but God knows about, enough to damn me a hundred times over. I'd offer to make reparations to the victims' families, even though I could tell them that money doesn't do anything but briefly dull the pain. And you—well, of all those I've wronged, you hardly need the money."

"True, but there is something you can do," Seto said.

"Oh? What is it? I'll do anything!"

"Tell me the _real_ reason you brought the Big Five that night."

Pegasus hugged himself. "It was complicated," he said.

"Simplify it."

"Some of it I wasn't even aware of until after the Eye's influence had faded."

"Blaming an ancient artifact to avoid responsibility for your actions? So your speech about Oedipus and choice was bullshit."

Pegasus scowled. "It's not as if I was some evil monster through and through from the day I was born!"

"Fine. If asked I will say that you weren't a selfish, backstabbing rapist until you were an adult."

"First of all," Pegasus said angrily, slapping his hand on the floor of the cell, "I _never_ touched you that way. _Ever_." He stopped, took a deep, shuddering breath. "Seto, don't you remember _any_ of the good things I did for you? I was your friend, I tried to protect you from Gozaburo, I nurtured your independence and self-confidence, I encouraged your creativity and innovations. Does all that count for nothing?"

Seto considered this. "Yes, you did all those. You gained my admiration, and my trust." He paused. "Only Mokuba was closer to my heart."

Pegasus hung his head.

"You did not force yourself on me physically, at least not that I remember. But in all other ways it was violation." He found himself feeling on the edge of tears, and it infuriated him. "You have admitted that you violated my mind many times, and on that night you allowed others to violate my body. None of the good you tried to do can ever compensate for that."

"You're right," Pegasus whispered after a long silence. "I am so, so, sorry. Truly, deeply sorry. If it will convince you, I will say it a hundred times more, a thousand."

"Say it all you want. You have yet to tell me why you let the Big Five—"

"Business," he said, hugging himself as he seemed to deflate. "It was a business decision."

"Business?" Seto repeated. "What do you mean, _business?"_ Although he had half-suspected as much for years, having it confirmed was a fresh wound. He'd not thought Pegasus capable of being so coldly calculating, of seeing people as nothing more than disposable resources or obstacles, only valuable as means to an end ... it was a shock to see a reflection of the way he had once been.

"It was obvious how much they hated you," Pegasus said. "And because they knew I'd been your friend, they didn't trust me. I had to get them on my side, and so I joked that I'd not only knock you off your high horse, but make you completely tractable. They wanted proof, said they wanted to see for themselves. I knew I had to mislead them about where my loyalties were, and so ... Letting them have you got them on my side. You of all people should understand."

"Understand _what_?"

"Well, what I did wasn't so different than what you did to Mokuba, was it? when you rejected him so cruelly in order to trick Gozaburo?"

"You _dare_ throw that in my face?" Seto asked. "It doesn't compare!"

"But he believed that you truly hated him. Did you know he still wasn't completely over it, even a year later? What hurt him most was that you hadn't let him in on your plan." Pegasus shrugged. "At least, that's what I saw when I looked into his mind."

This was news to Seto, but then, he and Mokuba hadn't ever talked much about it at the time, and once Mokuba was older, the topic had never come up. "Yes, I knew at the time that it would hurt him, but when I explained it to him later—that I had to be harsh to make it convincing, that I had only done it to ensure our future—he understood, and forgave me."

"Is that why you keep asking me to explain myself?" Pegasus asked. "If you understand, you'll forgive me?"

Seto had no reply to this.

"No, of course not. There's no way you could. Nor should you." Pegasus scuttled back from the bars and into a corner of the cell. "I just thought I'd get some credit for telling the truth."

"Credit?" Seto asked. "I see. I'd forgotten you were raised in a religious household. Confession is an attempt to clear your conscience before facing the afterlife? Noble to the last." He started to walk away.

"Wait!" Pegasus shouted. "Don't go!"

Seto kept going.

"Do you really remember?" Pegasus asked. "After so long?"

"The scars remind me," Seto said. _The terror, the anger, the loneliness._ His footsteps echoed down the corridor.

"I wanted to destroy you," Pegasus shouted. "The way you had destroyed Cynthia."

Seto stopped. "Cynthia?" He turned and walked back to Pegasus' cell. "A woman I never met, who died while Mokuba and I were in the orphanage?"

In answer, Pegasus materialized a card with a picture of a blond woman in a blue dress, then laid it on the cell floor in front of him. "She was the center of my universe," he said. "Sun, moon, crown of the heavens." He tilted his ruined face up toward Seto. "So when my attachment to you," he stopped and then said almost too low to hear, "my _feelings_ for you, began to eclipse my love for her ... it was as if you had defiled her. I hated you for it." He bowed his head again, looking down at the card he could not see. "But I was wrong. She would have wanted me to cherish you as I had cherished her. She would have wanted me," his breath seemed to catch, "wanted me to be your knight, to keep you safe, to hide you away from them." His voice was now a croak. "Instead I gave you to those— _hyenas_ —to be torn apart." He made a raw, sobbing sound. "I failed the only two people I've ever loved. Lost her. Destroyed you."

It was an admission that hardly sounded like Pegasus, which convinced Seto that it was genuine.

"I know my body is dying," Pegasus said. "I assume you'll want to keep my consciousness running to take revenge on me? If you truly want to punish me ... make sure your program won't let me paint. Art is the only thing I have left that gives me happiness, and if my being miserable will help you, make sure you take that away from me."

It was, Seto thought, in every way a quintessential Pegasus pronouncement: overly-dramatic, manipulative, and yet also reflecting genuine emotion—although, Pegasus being Pegasus, anything short of encasing him in concrete wouldn't be sufficient to stop him from painting.

"You're probably right! After all, you played _chess_ blindfolded," Pegasus said, and then, "After so many years, Seto, I hardly need the Eye to read your mind." He gave a sudden gasp. "I guess it's time for me to go. Goodbye, Kaiba-boy."

Seto stood for long moments after the image had faded. As the torches in the dungeon began to go out, he bent to pick up Cynthia's card, then began to climb the stairs up toward the light.

**.**

**.**

~ Epilogue to follow ~

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Author's Note: The ending here is somewhat abrupt, but this chapter ends _Beholden_ (the Epilogue will be the wrap-up for the entire series).

P.S. Anyone who know me knows I tend to sneak in after posting and fiddle; it's likely that this chapter, like many others, will acquire bits in the coming weeks or months.

(07) 17 September 2013


	8. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Pegasus' funeral, an impromptu outing leads to some final revelations.

 

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It seemed appropriate to take Cynthia's card to the studio.

As the elevator took him to the top floor he called Mokuba. "He's dead."

"Yes, did Kurosuke—"

"No," Seto said, "I was talking to him and he disappeared."

Mokuba didn't say anything for a moment: Seto could almost hear the thoughts he was having, the comments he wasn't expressing. "Huh. Guess he was connected to the recording after all." There was another pause. "So what are you doing now?"

"Looking at something in the studio," Seto said. "I'll be out shortly."

The four canvases were covered with tarps, with a slip of folded paper pinned to each. He propped the card with Cynthia's portrait on the small table that held Pegasus's palette and brushes, and then read the first: _Monster #1._

He threw back the tarp.

It was a painting he had seen before, the painting Pegasus had done the day he'd also painted the portrait of Seto that Gozaburo had hated. A dark room, lit only by a small trapezoid of yellow light coming from an open door in the upper left. A dark gray and brown blob filled the right half of the canvas, while in the foreground, a sorrowful child stared out at the viewer. If the child was meant to represent him, it certainly wasn't an accurate likeness. Artistic license, he supposed.

The second painting, _Prison_ , seemed to be unfinished. Against a background of stars, an angelic figure—complete with wings and a nimbus—reached up toward a glowing square. Above the square, circling it, were vague forms, clutching at their heads or throats or chests as the square siphoned a mist from them. Below the angel's feet was an area with no white star-dots, as if the angel were standing on a shadowed something that blocked the view of the sky.

He was studying the picture when he heard a noise in the hallway outside the studio. A moment later Mokuba appeared in the doorway.

Seto reached out and unfolded the paper on the third painting. _"Monster Redux."_ He lifted the tarp.

It was an abstract. On a black background, a tangled mass of jagged red lines took up the right half and the bottom of the canvas, almost obscuring small shards of blue in the lower left. In the dead center of the upper left quadrant was a very small square of yellow.

He shook his head. "It takes no talent to paint such boring nonsense."

"Probably not," Mokuba said, "but maybe it's supposed to be a variation on the first painting. Both have the little door," Mokuba said as he pointed to the yellow square, "but in this one the blue stuff is being attacked by the red scribbles instead of a big brown blob." Mokuba paused. "If the blue is you, and the red is Pegasus, it's like an admission of guilt, isn't it? Did the first one have a title?"

_"Monster."_

"Well, there you go," Mokuba said. As he reached for the paper on the last painting he asked, "So you talked to him again? How did it go?"

"It ... he admitted everything."

"Wow, really? That's—that's great!"

Mokuba looked so joyful that Seto bit back repeating what he'd said after Pegasus's first "apology": a few sentences weren't going to undo everything that had hung over him for half his life.

Mokuba read, " _Friendship's Embrace_ —hey, isn't that the name of the card design he drew on the _Funny Rabbit_ page?" He started to lift the tarp.

"Wait!"

But it was not the picture that Pegasus had drawn on wine on his comic book: there were no torches, no stone altars, no thinly-disguised Pegasus fondling a Seto-lookalike. Instead, the painting showed a hill, and behind it a sky gray with clouds. Against the sky, cresting the hill, was a warrior in ornate golden armor. Badly wounded, his face twisted in pain, he was standing only because several comrades supported him.

There was an index card on the easel, and Mokuba picked it up. " ' _T_ _ribute summon. Play on any card currently in defense mode. Switch both cards to attack mode, combining their attack and defense values. Friendship's Embrace can be used once per duel, and must be removed from play at the end of your turn_ _.'_ That's—that's kind of awesome."

Seto looked at the painting.

_your peers and friends will come to join and support you._

"Let's get out of here," he said to Mokuba. "I'm ready to go home."

 

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To Seto's relief, Mokuba took over the arrangements, tracking down where Cynthia was buried—Pegasus had built an elaborate mausoleum for two on his island—and flying those who wanted to attend the funeral to California.

The mausoleum, atop a sheltered overlook, was reached by a steep flight of stone stairs. The surprisingly religious graveside service was brief: just as it concluded, the sky clouded over and a warm misty rain began to fall, creating a ground fog that made descending the slippery stairs doubly treacherous.

"Overly dramatic and difficult to the last," Seto murmured.

By the time they reached the bottom of the stairs the shower had become a downpour. No one was enthusiastic about taking the open powerboats back to the mainland, so they congregated under the stone overhangs of the decrepit castle while Mokuba and Rebecca made calls to see what could be done.

Jounouchi, who had come to the funeral with Mai and a tall blond man who seemed familiar—Rafael, was it? from the Paradius organization—caught Seto's eye and then walked over to him, chuckling. "I was just telling Mai that the last time I got soaked at a funeral I wound up drying my socks at your place."

An opening, it seemed. He was about to ask, _Are they wet now?_ but as he glanced at Mai—she was standing close to Rafael, holding his hand, looking up at him in what seemed an intimate way—Rafael said something, and nodded in their direction. Mai turned to look at Jounouchi, and once again Seto felt comprehension dawning. "Are those two," he asked Jounouchi instead, "your 'people' ?"

"Well," Jounouchi said, rubbing the back of his neck, a gesture Seto remembered with nostalgia. "It's ... we kinda bonded at Varon's funeral. We've spent a lot of time together since."

Seto assumed that getting such an evasive equivocation instead of a straightforward "Yes" to his question likely meant that the situation was "complicated," but then that wasn't surprising. Everything to do with human beings—and Jounouchi in particular—was complicated. Convoluted and random and only slightly comprehensible. Qualitative analysis only took one so far.

As the rain was starting to subside, it seemed they would all take the powerboats after all. Seto, not wanting to be packed in like a sardine, hung back; Mokuba did as well, as did Jounouchi.

There was something about the sight of the boat, churning away from the dock with its black-clothed payload, or about the realization that he'd never need come to this island again, or perhaps it was just the rays of sun beginning to poke through the dark gray clouds—whatever it was, he felt a an almost buoyant sense of release, expanding and rising and making him so lightheaded that he started to laugh. He supposed it was simply a natural reaction, a biochemical response to a release of tension, but it felt ... it felt _good_ , better than anything he could remember feeling in years.

"You? Laughing?" Jounouchi said. "Now I'm scared."

The rain started again, a tentative drizzle.

"No point in going back up to the castle," Mokuba said.

"Nope." Jounouchi sat on a large flat stone near the dock, wincing. "Ya know, Kaiba, that's one advantage of your virtual worlds. You can make it so that the virtual rain doesn't soak the virtual pants, thus keeping the virtual ass from getting waterlogged."

"I have never decided," Seto said, noting Mokuba's grin, "if the criteria for a virtual reality's success should be how closely it corresponds to the real world, or how imaginatively it transcends it."

"Maybe it depends on the reality," Mokuba said.

Seto lifted his hand. He found the sight of the raindrops oddly entertaining: the way they gathered into beads and then raced down his fingers, hesitating before they dripped off.

"Now don't get me wrong," Jounouchi said. "Those places you create—they're amazing. But the real world's more interesting, because it's always changing."

"Unpredictability can be programmed," Seto said. "Random number generators to determine intervals and outcomes, and Mandelbrot—"

"You're missing the point," Jounouchi said. "If you program it, you'd still know when something random is coming. Not only that, but you'd know all the things it could be."

"So being unprepared and being taken completely off guard are good?"

"Well, no, not when you put it that way," Jounouchi said. "But if you always know all the ways something could turn out, it takes some of the fun out of taking chances. There's no _bam!_ when something surprising happens." And then his face fell, and he said, "Sorry. I guess being taken by surprise isn't always … it's not always good."

Seto wondered how long it would be before everyone stopped talking about it. Soon, preferably.

The rain stopped again, but the sun sulked behind thin clouds.

"What will you do with the recording?" Mokuba asked.

"I might try to edit it," Seto said.

"Edit?"

"Erasing the most recent changes to the file is trivial," Seto said. "But to delete or adjust key events in his timeline—that might be interesting."

"Key events? Like the death of his wife?" Mokuba asked.

"That's one," Seto replied. "If she had lived, he might not have gone to Egypt. Remove Egypt, and he doesn't receive the Eye, never invents the game, doesn't found Industrial Illusions." _Never would have kidnapped you, never would have held Duelist Kingdom._

"Maybe," Jounouchi said, sounding skeptical. "But maybe all that stuff would've happened anyhow. Like, maybe they would've gone to Egypt for their honeymoon? If she hadn't died he probably would've been a different person, but different doesn't mean he'd be better. Maybe he'd have turned out _worse_. Messing with the timeline is always a bad idea."

"You watch too much science fiction," Mokuba said affectionately.

Seto shrugged. "Isn't being with someone you love supposed to make a difference? Inspiring you to be a better person, for their sake if not your own?"

"That's downright romantic," Jounouchi said, grinning. "You're getting scary again, Kaiba."

Seto shook the raindrops from his hand, smirking when the splatters hit Jounouchi.

"This is all moot," Mokuba said. "It's going to be impossible to edit digital Pegasus's memories. Way too complicated, way too many interconnections and loose ends, right?"

"Most likely." But he already had the beginning of how to structure a schema for mapping memory sectors in four dimensions, and how to implement feedback loops so that the program would pause and alert him if missing sectors were referenced. Then too, it would be simple to create a baseline Cynthia from modified recordings of Ishizu and Mai ...

"So, um," Mokuba said, "since so many people were here in California already, I invited them to hang out at the house for a few days and help me test a project. I, ah, hope you don't mind?"

Seto sighed. "I suppose you'll require me to be present?"

"C'mon, it'll be fun," Jounouchi said. "Kick back, use the pool, give the grills a workout, do some hiking, play some cards ..."

"Yeah, I'd appreciate your feedback," Mokuba said.

"What is this project?"

"A virtual module I put it together a while ago," Mokuba said. "Been waiting for the right time to test it, but you have a genius for avoiding every opportunity I've had to run it with a large enough group."

"Oh!" Jounouchi said. "Is this the—?" He made strange motions with his arms.

Mokuba ignored him. "We can use KaibaLand. Everyone can enjoy the park, and after closing we can take over the pods."

"I've never seen anything in your files." He folded his arms, slightly annoyed that Mokuba was being so mysterious.

"Of course not," Mokuba chuckled. "It's not _in_ my regular files. I know how good a snoop you are. _And_ how good you are at covering your tracks." He lifted his head. "Sounds like the boat's coming back."

"I don't see why you feel the need to hide things from me," Seto asked as they started to move toward the dock.

"Everyone needs a few secrets," Mokuba said, "that stay secret."

.

Seto was surprised at the number of people who gathered at the entrance of Blue Eyes Ultimate World.

"Most of these didn't come to the funeral," he said to Mokuba.

"Nope, I flew them in," Mokuba said.

He watched, bemused, as Mokuba—very efficiently—dispatched groups to every building in KaibaLand. When only the two of them were left he asked, "And now?"

"We'll use our personal pods in the castle. I know how you hate to mingle with the commoners."

"Very funny."

.

They zoned into the center of a clearing in a sunlight forest.

"This is it?" Seto said.

"Don't be so impatient," Mokuba said.

After a several seconds a half circle of chairs materialized along the perimeter of the clearing, and then several seconds later another row of chairs inside that, and then another. Seto, puzzled, saw shadows moving in the woods, coming toward them through the trees and out into the sunlight.

One by one, they filed into the clearing and down the rows of chairs, taking what seemed to be assigned seats. Yugi, Anzu, Rebecca, Ishizu, Rishid, Jounouchi, Mai, Otogi, Ryou, Honda, Shizuka, Amelda, Noroshi, Kurosuke ... Jounouchi, Seto noted, took a seat in the back row, between Mai and Rafael, but waved when he saw him.

"This is even more than were at the park," Seto said to Mokuba.

"Some made special arrangements," Mokuba replied cryptically, materializing a chair. "Now, sit here and pay attention."

Seto did as he was told.

Mokuba signaled the audience for silence. "Before we start, there's a few things I want to say," he began. "It's sad—but also very fitting—that Pegasus's death provided us opportunity to finish this project. Grief—any suffering really—can make you feel completely alone, cut off from the rest of humanity. It can make you feel broken, drive you to extremes.

"Whether you or not you come back depends on whether there's someone there for you. A friend, a family member, a caring person from your community, even a random kind stranger. Someone to keep real life at bay for a while, to offer a shoulder if you need something solid to lean on. Someone to pull you back from the edge if you start to fall into the abyss, and guide you without making you feel dragged along. Someone who accepts that it'll take a while before you want to laugh or love or even be civil again."

Seto thought about how, every year, Yugi and his friends had come to Mokuba's memorial service, unacknowledged; how many times they'd left messages which he'd furiously deleted, unheard.

"Even before I came back from the dead," Mokuba continued, "I've wanted to do a project that celebrates life and how we learn to live it." He paused to scratch his ear. "Wow, when I say that out loud it sounds a lot cornier and more grandiose than it looked on paper." He waited until everyone had stopped laughing before he went on. "Let's say instead that I wanted to celebrate the part that our friends play in our survival."

"Now, before I started this project I'd heard the term 'concerto' but didn't actually know what it meant. When I looked it up I found out that—and okay, I admit I memorized this next part—'in a concerto, the soloist and the orchestra alternate themes of opposition, cooperation, and independence.' I thought that was a very cool concept. It seemed a perfect format for the project, but I did see one problem. I didn't know many professional musicians."

There was another ripple of light laughter.

"However, thanks to virtual reality, anyone can be a musical prodigy if their heart's in the right place. And if I didn't botch the programming too badly." He flicked his wrist, and in an instant everyone in the audience was holding an instrument: woodwinds, brass, percussion, strings.

Mokuba then turned slightly to face Seto. "So, big brother," he said quietly, using a nickname he hadn't used since they were kids, "I call this _Concerto for Violin and an Orchestra of Friends."_

Seto stared down at the violin in his hands. Violin? He was the soloist?

"I know I've put you on the spot," Mokuba said, "but trust me—the first note is always the scariest."

Opposition, cooperation, independence.

He glanced up. Yugi, Jounouchi, Ishizu, Kurosuke ...

.

  
_"Be careful, Kaiba-kun! Watch out for his Dragon-Sealing Jar!"_  
"So you're safe? We were worried!"  
"Kaiba! Wait for me!"  
"Thank you, Seto."  
 _"Have courage. You will persevere."_  
.

"I'm ready," he said, tucking the violin between his shoulder and chin. As he lifted the bow he realized to his astonishment that he actually _did_ want to play.

 

.

_"... the time of darkness is past.  
After the time of decay comes the turning point.  
The powerful light that has been banished returns."_

_._

The sound of the concerto floated up into the sunlit air, radiant and graceful and welcoming and pure.

 

.

.

_~ The end ~_

.

.

.

So ends the saga that started with 2002's _KP Duty_.

First, I want to again express my deeply-felt gratitude to **Musouka** , **Rroselavy** , and **Dark Rabbit** , the three godmothers who, at various times over the past eleven years, have shepherded me though the at times difficult gestation and birth of this series. I would never have been able to see it through without them. ~ I would like to thank my family, who have tolerated me locking myself in my office to write on weekends more times than I want to count; and finally, I thank those who took the time to review these long, sometimes overwritten stories over the years: your comments have always managed to throw a log onto the fire every time I was down to embers.

I do have Author's Notes for this story, but they're going to take some time to edit. They'll show up eventually.

(I can say that the first four quotes at the end are from episodes 26, 45, 67, and 94; the last is from _KP Duty_.)

.

(07) 22 April 2014 ~ Fix awkward sentence


End file.
